Nothing like a tale of woe to kick off a Friday. How do you get your landlord to fix your apartment when you've already passed on earlier attempts to gussy up the place? We're at a loss here, but maybe you can help. Here goes:
My boyfriend and I just moved into a rent-stabilized apartment in Hudson Heights. Right before we signed the lease, the broker called to say that the landlord offered to renovate the apartment before we moved in, adjusting our rent by 100 additional dollars per month. This would also mean that we couldn't move in on Nov. 1 - we'd have to move in Dec. 1, but pay for half of the November rent. We declined, mostly because we weren't flexible on the move-in date. Now that we've been in the apartment for a few days, we have realized that there are some fairly big problems to be fixed in order to make this pre-war apartment truly liveable. First we considered handling them ourselves – sanding & refinishing the bedroom floor, putting down new kitchen linoleum (to replace the ugly, peeling current linoleum). But really, who in their right mind would sink money into a rental? My question is, now we would like to propose to the landlord that he make some improvements while we live in the apartment. What is the best way to do this? Has anyone out there been in a similar situation and could share some advice?
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