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Missing landlord
Scroffus
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
We don't have any contact details for our landlord. My housemate had a phone number for her, but it was on his old phone (which he no longer has). We have a few pressing issues that need to be fixed (broken shower, fridge stopped working). As we have no way to contact her, my housemate had the idea to stop paying rent for a month until she contacted us. Is this a terrible idea? Another idea was to buy a fridge on our own then ask her to take the money of the rent when we can get in contact with her. Is this terrible too? Do you have any suggestions?
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I mean, when it comes to that type of situation where you are doing the repairs out of your own pocket and expecting to be reimburse, it comes from Landlord neglect.
Here, it doesn't sound so much as your landlord went missing as that you guys lost her contact information, which no one is going to blame the landlord on.
You can call your phone company and get call records of outgoing calls from your friends old phone and find when you last called her.
You cannot just stop paying rent because you lost her number.
You can stop paying SOME rent if she isnt keeping up the property - but only after you notify her its going to happen unless she fixes it.
If you went directly to the landlord, where did you find out about the location? If it was in a classifieds or periodical, most newspapers keep an archive of past issues for people to look through. You can probably request the issues from around the time you leased the place and find the advertisement.
Also also, check under your sink, in the back of your pantry, or somewhere in your garage. Most landlords keep a packet of useful information (manuals for water heaters, refrigerators, ac units, etc) along with the paint colors and carpet samples somewhere on site for when renters/contractors need to replace things. Usually these are tucked out of sight somewhere.
Finally, you can go to your bank that you do the money transfer and request the information. They will likely provide the number on the account you have been depositing to once you explain your situation.
I'll try to look for a pack around the house, don't think I've seen one yet (been there for about a year or so).
Not sure if the bank will be able to give out any details, I'm in the UK and most places aren't aloud to give out any information about anyone (even if it's your own info) but I'll give them a call and ask.
Don't live in an apartment building, don't really know any of my neighbours either (one is an old couple, the other is a family of 2-3).
Thanks for the suggestions so far, they are quite helpful. Would buying a fridge in the meantime and then asking her to refund the cost later be a bad idea too? Need to make plans if we can't find her.
Edit:
What Bowen said, and also if they won't give you the contact information they may call on your behalf as you have a record of sending payment. Just explain it calmly to the bank manager and wear something professional when you go.
Typically you can't legally do something like that without giving the landlord the chance to replace the fridge first.
As many-handed as a cuttlefish.
you can't even do that in MD. To not pay rent you need a judges approval, to pay the rent into an escrow account that the landlord can only access once he's fixed the issues, and the same judge approves it.
This. Your roommate should have the original lease from when he moved in, and that should definitely include contact information for the landlord. If your roommate doesn't have the lease, well then that's a bad thing anyway and once you do find your landlord's contact info you should get a copy from him/her.
Do not buy a new fridge in the meantime unless you can afford to not be reimbursed for it, because as has been mentioned you generally need to get approval for that type of thing ahead of time, and your landlord may just want to replace the fridge on their own instead of having you buy it.
would a company just give out his private phone records like that?
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I think Enc is suggesting that your friend call his OWN phone company and get a copy of his bill. On my cell bill with Verizon all the numbers you call are listed individually, so it'd be pretty easy to find the right number.