Now that I have some time, I can update you all on the landlord situation. We were really torn over what to do, we just wanted it to be done and him to go away so we considered paying him. But, then we thought, he is just going to keep doing this to people and that is wrong too. However, it is not our responsibility to stop the big, bad landlord. So, as a compromise, Trevor wrote him a letter, a four page letter informing him that what he was doing was not only morally wrong but against the law. I will not bore you with the entire four page letter but I will include a few sections since I am so proud of it. He did not put any emotion into the letter but cold, hard facts.
Let's get to the rest of your itemization (this was after responding to him wanting us to reside the house due to cable installation). This is where I really was enlightened on Minnesota law and what a renter is really responsible for and what a landlord is really responsible for. I am assuming from this summary thatyou have either not studied Minnesota Stautue 5041B.161 or perhaps do not completely understand the meaning of it. Basically, the statute says that the landlord is responsible for the maintenance unless there is specific compesation to the tenant for doing this work. This means that you would have had to have a value in the lease for this maintenance such as reduced rent or payment for services. Therefore, none of the outside work that was done (trimming trees, etc) can be charged and non of the items that are considered standard maintenance items that were done on the inside of the house can be charged i.e. the water filter, batteries, mouse poison, light bulbs, etc.
He then basically then told him all of the good things that we did for him and not once asked to be compensated and how he cannot believe his obvious hatred towards us when we did nothing but take care of his home. He also told him how the last lawyer he spoke to just won a case that was pretty much identical to this one so there now is precendence on this subject. Trevor also informed him that by he asking us to have the septic tank pumped, which we did was actually against the law.
So after debating every single thing that the landlord had on the list, this is the final paragraph of the letter.
I am hoping that we can come to a reasonable agreement without taking this to court. This would be to the benefit of everyone as I am sure that you are as busy as I am right now. I absolutely do not want to go to court, but if that is what we have to do to get a resolution, then that is what we have to do. I will, however, tell you that if you make me go to court over this, I am going to go for back pay on the maintenance that we did on your house that I was not reimbursed for. I will charge the $25 epr house that you set as your rate and will add up all of the hours that we spent doing the things that you were responsible for, by law, to take care of. Normally this would just be mowing, shoveling and whatnot but you actually sent me a detailed list of things that were expected of me and I did most of them thoughout the lease. There was well over 100 hours alone in just the spring clean up. I will also add in $500 "bad faith" as allowed by the law for keeping my security deposit without charges that were within the law.
My suggestion to you is that you speak with a lawyer that knows the Minnesota rent laws and how they are applied. If anything, it may help you to avoid this type of confrontation in the future.
In about one week's time, we received an email from our prior landlord stating that "thank you for your letter, it was very informative. We are mailing out a check today, check number 4440 and you should receive it in 3-4 business days".
We received the check and all is done. So, my faith in humanity is starting to come back, just a little. Thank you to everyone who sent me emails and gave us advice, we truely appreciate it.
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