My question involves landlord-tenant law for an apartment in the State of Colorado: Should the rental company be liable to replace our lost goods from the refrigerator not working, and are they liable for our water being unsafe? This was the condition of our apartment before we moved in.
Our water has been brown since we moved in, though we didn't notice it the first couple days before submitting our "move-in inspection." About one week later we called the rental agency and informed them of our problems, which in addition to unclean water (forcing us to purchase tons of bottled water jugs, and shower in the dirty water), are as follows:
Refrigerator was shut during kitchen renovations before we moved into the unit, and the electrical breaker was shut off for the kitchen as well. Black mold was already present in the freezer, since the door had been shut for so long without power. Not realizing the breaker was switched off, we had no place for our perishables and we were forced to dispose of them. Close to $100! If that wasn't bad enough, a couple days later we switched on the breaker and found that it restored power to the refrigerator. The refrigerator said give it 24 hours to stabilize temperature, so we waited and then it felt cold so we re-stocked our refrigerator. Later we found lots of moisture in the refrigerator and realized it wasn't reaching safe cool temperatures. This resulted in more loss of produce!
The lease we signed is "Colorado Apartment Association - Apartment Lease Contract" which is the standard Equal Housing Opportunity lease for the state of Colorado. No addendum included mentions anything else about maintenance and repair.
Should we hold the rental company liable for our loss of goods? Unclean water? Bottled water expenses? It's been 2 1/2 weeks and we have already paid for water and electricity (both of which have not worked properly since we moved in).
Thanks in advance! I appreciate your help so much!
-Chad

