
Quoting
nina b
My question involves landlord-tenant law in the State of: California
My husband and I rent an apartment above a business. The owner of the
building also owns the business, but his agent runs it for him. The
agent was the one who rented it to us, drew up the 6 month lease,
collected the rent etc. The agent is now hell bent on destroying our
lives by using whatever means necessary.
Come mid-December, we will have resided here a year. Had a six month
lease, then it went to a month to month. We are not in the rears in
our rent and have had no complaints from the other tenants in the
building. We are middle aged, quiet and conscientious folks.
Eight months ago, the agent beat the crap out of one of our guests
after he (the agent) entered our apt uninvited. Our guest chose not to
involve the police. Since then, it's been one thing after another and
we are now being forced out of our home due to his daily calls
complaining about fabricated events to the owner. The owner is sick of
dealing with the situation (as are we) and has recently offered us
another apartment a short distance away to help solve the problem. It
is three times smaller than where we live now and we would have to
rent a storage facility for the majority of our belongings. End
result: the new place would end up costing us about $200 more than we
currently pay here, and we simply can not afford it. We would love
nothing more than to get out of here, but we haven't been able to
leave because of serious financial restraints.
The owner called after we looked at the other place and asked when we
were going to be moving in. He wants us out of here now. I explained
the money issue to him and asked if we had any other option. He yelled
"Either you move your stuff out, or it will be moved out for you. I
don't owe you anything." Fair enough, I suppose. He is entitled to
unconditionally terminate our tenancy with proper notice. However, I
feel we've been exceedingly nice about things up to this point
considering his agent has....
assaulted our guest
threatened us with a gun saying he is "just waiting for my husband to snap"
hired local gang members to come threaten our lives, as well as the
life of another one of our guests
continuously slanders me to anyone who will listen, saying I'm a "drug
addict" and a "whore"
opened our mail
threatened another guest of ours with great bodily injury (breaking
his nose) if he didn't give him the key to our apt he had for
emergencies
caused us to be so fearful that I can no longer leave my home without an escort
brought about an environment resulting in the decline in my health, 3
days in the critical care unit, then another seven days in the
hospital (at a price of almost $300k) in which my ulcers almost killed
me
and continues verbally harassing us on a nearly daily basis due to the
fact that we can not leave, nor enter our apartment without passing
his always opened office door.
Normally, the police would be my recourse, but with the gang
involvement, our hands are kind of tied. Never mind the fact that the
police told my friend who was threatened with the breaking of his nose
that he could threaten us as much as he wants. They won't get involved
until someone gets hurt, which made me laugh.
Because of the lack of funds we are trapped here. We do have the
option of the other place, but can't afford to do that either.
Do we have any legal recourse with the manager situation here?
Restraining order? Harassment? Anything? I don't want to force this to
an eviction if I can avoid it, but we may have no other choice because
we can't afford to get the hell out.
Thank you very much for taking the time to read through this mess.
I've tried to make it as concise and short (believe it or not!) as
possible. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.