Maintenance People and Manager Comes in Once a Month, Can I Do Anything About It

[rachel3]

My question involves landlord-tenant law in the State of: Missouri

Hi! I'm new here and I really need some help.

I feel my privacy is being invaded in my new apartment. My apt manager feels the need to check my apartment for damage and do pest control every month while I'm not there. It bothers me because I have a puppy that I'm concerned will get into the pest control stuff and I hardly want people I don't know in and out of my apartment every single month. I've never been in an apartment where they needed to "check for repairs" and it honesty just feels like nosiness. My manager is a very savvy woman who knows her stuff (or at least thinks she does) Is there a way that I can confront her while having the law on my side, or do I have no say over this at all?

Thanks, your answer is much apperciated

R

[SChinFChin]

My question involves landlord-tenant law in the State of: Missouri

Hi! I'm new here and I really need some help.

I feel my privacy is being invaded in my new apartment. My apt manager feels the need to check my apartment for damage and do pest control every month while I'm not there. It bothers me because I have a puppy that I'm concerned will get into the pest control stuff and I hardly want people I don't know in and out of my apartment every single month. I've never been in an apartment where they needed to "check for repairs" and it honesty just feels like nosiness. My manager is a very savvy woman who knows her stuff (or at least thinks she does) Is there a way that I can confront her while having the law on my side, or do I have no say over this at all?

Thanks, your answer is much apperciated

R

Well, I am a LL, and I have the opposite problem.

I have rented to people who had problems keeping their homes clean, as an example, leave dishes in the sink on the way out to work, and leftover food on the dinner table the night before. And because leaving combat around is of limited help, I had to get exterminators to come. If I didn't, neighboring units can call "code enforcement", and I would be cited for violations.

Many of these exterminators offer gauanties, BUT I have to do it their way. Their way means they have to do ALL of the units. I can't argue with them that if they spray one unit, the roaches would then run and hide in the other. But if I say "quiet enjoyment" prevents me from spraying the neighboring units, then they'll say "fine, we are not going to guaranty it", and if code enforcement ever comes calling, we can all say that there is this one unit we can never spray that the roaches go and hide. But I would still be cited.

And spraying 2 units one day, and doing the other two days later doesn't count either, because they tell me the roaches run to the other units, then comes back, so still no guaranty. I don't know if you ever tried to schedule things so EVERY SINGLE TENANT is home at exactly the same time?? And I would be charged for yet ANOTHER visit.

When some of these tenants squawk, I tell them the beauty of renting or owning a single family home is that it's easier to make things around YOUR SCHEDULE, and loads of "quiet enjoyment", so they should find a SFH to move to.

Besides owning rentals, I own a two family house that I live in, and I have a tenant there for over 8 years if not ten years. I never had a roach problem till he came, and it got really bad that I went from no roaches at all to seeing at least 10 or more scurrying all over the sink if I have to come to the kitchen at night. Some years ago, he tells me he cannot allow his apartment to be sprayed because of his daugher's allergies.

So FOR HIS QUIET ENJOYEMENT, had to get 4 to 6 boxes of "combat" every six months, that's about 70 to 80 bait traps, to place around my kitchen, foyer area. About a year ago, we went down to do some repairs, and we noticed the clock on the stove had baby roaches all inside it, dozens crawling around, some dead, it was so disgusting that we told him that we have to get a new stove, and I'm still shaking thinking about it.

Other than that, they are wonderful tenants, nice people, they took all the carpeting off promising it'll be replaced one day when they leave. I had another tenant just as worst years back, and I had to take up all the carpeting when he left.

YES, my tenant has quiet enjoyment, and it's my choice to live with HIS roaches, but most people under the circumstances would not. I'm not the confrontational type, and if one day I didn't like the guy downstairs, I would ask him to leave.

Oh, every morning, my pet project is to run to the kitchen to see how many roaches I can find running around the sink. There is none today, but I caught two yesterday. And that's with over 60 roach traps in the kitchen area.

But at least my tenant has his "quiet enjoyment". Would you put up with it???

[rachel3]

While I appreciate your other side of the fence view, I don't really feel like my question was answered. Is there anything I can do about my manager "checking for damages" in my new apartment? I understand that pest control may be mandatory but I think once a month is a little excessive.

I do wish you luck in your power struggle with your tenants. My apartment is not in that condition and to clarify I'm not asking to never have pest control. Thank you for your insight on the need to do every unit, on the same day. I did not know that. I'm not sure that this apartment complex does that, but it would be interesting to find out, and if they can't then from what you've said I don't see any reason why the bugs would be dying anyway.

I'm also not trying to say that my manager should be scheduling things around my needs but I do feel like some of the checking for repairs is actually just her being nosey. When she comes in she always comments on the placement of my furniture or some other little thing. Its not really warranted anyway because my apartment is one of the newer updated units and I keep it in pretty immaculate conditions.

[SChinFChin]

While I appreciate your other side of the fence view, I don't really feel like my question was answered. Is there anything I can do about my manager "checking for damages" in my new apartment? I understand that pest control may be mandatory but I think once a month is a little excessive.

I do wish you luck in your power struggle with your tenants. My apartment is not in that condition and to clarify I'm not asking to never have pest control. Thank you for your insight on the need to do every unit, on the same day. I did not know that. I'm not sure that this apartment complex does that, but it would be interesting to find out, and if they can't then from what you've said I don't see any reason why the bugs would be dying anyway.

I'm also not trying to say that my manager should be scheduling things around my needs but I do feel like some of the checking for repairs is actually just her being nosey. When she comes in she always comments on the placement of my furniture or some other little thing. Its not really warranted anyway because my apartment is one of the newer updated units and I keep it in pretty immaculate conditions.

Here's the bottom line. Read your lease, and it'll allow the landlord to do routine maintenance repairs, and spraying for roaches under a contract monthly is very routine in the major cities here, and it would be absolutely NEGLIGIENT that a landlord would not have such a clause in his lease where all the tenant has to shout "quiet enjoyment" and everything is stopped in it's tracks. I know this because when I was a tenant, I took my lease to a lawyer to look at, and he told me the lease allows the landlord to come in under a variety of circumstances, in my case, when I gave him notice I'm leaving, and he has to show my place. And before I was able to press on my next question, he told me many people thought 24 hours notice means that "the tenant has to agree to be there", and no leases that he is aware of requires the landlord to have the tenant there after giving the 24 hour notice.

For buildings with roach infestation problems, the schedule is about once a month, and even more if there are additional complaints, i.e the roaches are still there after spraying. When I allude to "a guaranty", I'm referring to a "no charge visit". But I'll have to follow the protocol, monthly spraying and for all units. The senior center I'm with has pest control come in, it's monthly, and we call them in additionally at no charge if what they did is insufficient.

If this presents such an inconvenience, live somewhere where there is no need to do monthly spraying. The problem here is if the LL attempts to please you, he'll have problems with code enforcement, his other tenants, the pest control company to name a few.

In the house I live in, I did not spray to not inconvenience the tenant (wonder who won the power struggle??), but if I have another tenant in this building, his refusal to allow routine spraying would place our family, I have two young girls, and others in jeopardy (roaches carries diseases and is a cause of asthma for children) that I would have to evict him to assure the safety of others. In other words, if pest control tells me that monthly spraying is necessary, and a tenant tells me it won't work for her, I would have to ask the tenant to leave.

If a too talkative property manager bothers you, tell him or her to mind her business, but in some locations, frequent spraying is essential, and I lived in one such neighborhood. When you get quiet enjoyment, so would the roaches, and they'll run all over.

[Mr. Knowitall]

It looks like your state offers little guidance or restriction on entries by a landlord.

[Wynflid]

“If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.”

http://www.secondhandkitchens.com.au