Leak Damage: Can sue for damages covering only damaged floor or floor in the entire property? Apartment owner B, claims a leak from apartment owner A above, supposedly damaged a very small portion of B's hallway floor. Owner A offered to replace the hallway floor. Instead owner B insists that owner A must replace entire flooring in the entire apartment since B claims the new portion of the floor in the hallway, will not match 100% cosmetically with the rest of the undamaged apartment floor. Can owner B sue for damages to replace all of the flooring in the entire apartment even though only a very small isolated portion was damaged? And if so, what are the chances of B winning? Jurisdiction: US, Florida
Both outcomes are possible. A's insurance company would resist full replacement, so B would probably have to sue and prove that full replacement was necessary. Since the basic idea behind compensation is making the person whole after having been harmed, and what is the harm in a more limited repair job? The jury would contemplate all of the details regarding B's apartment. Then it matters just how crisp the floor was originally, and how aesthetically offensive a mere 99% match would be. It would not hinge solely on B's self-serving statement that he would not accept less than 100% match. But the award would not be limited to &quot;the cheapest possible repair&quot;.
There's a lot of variables here, as many leases are built in different ways within the leeway allowed by law. You will want to contact a local lawyer to see how you can mitigate the damage to yourself, and contact your landlord and see if you can re-negotiate the lease. If the landlord doesn't want to re-negotiate, you're probably facing eviction if you can't come up with the full rent by yourself; many leases don't allow non-related adults to live on the premises if they're not on the lease (this can also result in eviction). However, your roommate will also get an eviction record and be responsible for any damages if the lease survives long enough to cause an eviction. Actually having a random person move in from Craigslist might also cause your roommate to suffer additional liability if they're not allowed to sublet their lease agreement, which many leases do not allow (landlords like knowing who's living on their properties). Having them move in might cause both you and your roommate to be evicted. You probably don't have any rights to sue your roommate until actual damages occur (in other words, after you've already been evicted). You should speak with your landlord as soon as possible to get a new lease. An eviction record will cause problems for your roommate as well, so you might urge them to consider staying long enough to get things sorted out legally. When you ask your landlord, simply ask something like, "My roommate wants to move out. What are my options?" They will tell you what they are willing to accept.
You would report unpermitted lock replacement to the home owner. The building code regulates new construction and renovations, and is not a requirement of any and all residences. This seems to correspond to a "secondary suite", which is supposed to be registered with the city (if it is allowed in your city). Here is a link for Vancouver, for instance. Such suites are supposed to be registered and inspected, the inspection being carried out by Development, Building and Licencing: By-Law Compliance &amp; Administration (a division of the city government). This article discusses some of the legal problems that can arise from an illegal secondary suite, however the penalties would land on the property owner, and he may not have approved of this subletting or the basement suite. A less-nuclear first step would therefore be reporting it to the property owner.
There is no real answer to that question at this point. If on filed such a suit, it would probably be under a negligence theory. You would sue: Forbes, because they're the website the user visited? The ad network that provided a vector for infection and didn't properly check their content? The makers of the ad, because they made the ad with malicious intent? and anyone else who might have been negligent. You then have to prove they were negligent. Can the user sue the responsible party for damages? You can sue anyone for anything. The problem is winning. Does it make a difference whether the user has taken due diligence with software updates and patches? It might. Contributory negligence would be an obvious defense to such a suit.
This is a very difficult situation. Discrimination is not the right frame within which to view this as your roommate doesn't have authority over you the way that an employer or landlord would. The basic legal issue would be whether your roommate is constructively evicting you from you residence without valid justification for doing so. And, the answer might very well be yes. But, even if that is the case, since the roommate is not an agent of the landlord, your roommate's actions probably don't relieve you from your duties under the lease. So, your relief might be to vacate the premises and then to sue the roommate for the rent you have to pay without receiving anything in return. This is expensive relative to the likely returns, and there is no certainty that you would win or that you would get your attorneys' fees if you prevailed. This would also be a slow solution taking several months at a minimum. Or, in the alternative, you could leave and cease paying the rent, forcing the roommates who remain to pay it if they don't want to be evicted as they are probably jointly and severally liable for the rent. (If they sued you for your share of the rent, constructive eviction by one of them would probably be a good defense.) The landlord could sue all of the roommates if they don't pay, causing them to be evicted and you to be on the hook for any rent or other amounts that they owe, including the landlord's attorneys' fees (and hurting your credit). You could probably cross-claim for indemnification of any amounts you were required to pay in that lawsuit against your roommate. But, this too would be an expensive, complex and slow solution if the remaining roommates don't decide to simply keep paying the rent. It would be very hard for you to evict your problem roommate for breaching the lease by denying you your equal rights to the premises, since you are not the landlord, although it isn't impossible that a court would allow this relief and it would be relatively quick. It would also leave open the question of who was responsible for the evicted roommate's rent. The remaining roommates would be liable vis-a-vis the landlord, and would face eviction if they don't pay, and probably couldn't get a new roommate without the landlord's permission. And, the evicted tenant would probably remain on the hook vis-a-vis the landlord, but might not have a duty to indemnify the roommates who stayed. Also, in any lawsuit where you sue the roommate, the roommate would likely counterclaim against you for non-disclosure of HSV2, and while that would probably not prevail in the end, it would make the legal process hellish for you. The trouble is that there are really no good solutions that you could easily impose on them. A mutual agreement between the landlord and the other tenants to release you from the lease so you could find somewhere else, or to release the problem tenant from the lease so that you and your other roommate could replace that person, is probably the best solution, but that takes mutual agreement of multiple parties.
Not a lawyer, but: In many countries, a purchased item is your property once you removed it from the premises of the seller. In practice, this rarely makes a difference. You have entered a contract with the seller where the seller has to deliver the product, and you have to pay the money, you did your part, they have to do their part. There would be a difference if the item was stolen while in the store, or damaged by fire, or if the store went bankrupt and bailiffs took the item. If these rules apply in your country, then what they did is not theft, otherwise it would be theft (in all countries, if the store removed the door from your home after it is installed, that would be theft). You paid for a door, the store owes you a door. You have a legal contract. Both sides are bound by that legal contract. They have to do what the contract says (delivering the door that was displayed in the store), if they can't, then they have to do the nearest thing that isn't to your disadvantage, like delivering a new door. Or possible a different door that was on display. They can't just declare your contract invalid because it suits them better. That wouldn't be the case if this would put the store at an unacceptable disadvantage. For example, if thieves had broken into the store and stolen ten doors, including yours, the store might get away with returning your money. Since they intentionally sold your door again to someone else, I don't think they could use this as an excuse. I'd go once more to the store and ask them whether they want to deliver a door to you, according to your contract with the store, or if they want you to get a lawyer. A letter from a lawyer might work wonders. (Or of course the lawyer might tell you that I'm completely wrong, but they don't know that, so telling them that you will hire a lawyer might be enough).
Michigan law say nothing about landlord entry, so whatever it says in the lease is what is allowed. Various sources like this comment on the lack of such statutory regulations. There does not appear to be any relevant case law for Michigan which impose restrictions on a landlord's right to access a rental. Since there is no statutory or case law restriction on landlord's right to access his property, landlord's agent would have the same right to access. That would mean that if the listing agent were authorized by the landlord to enter, then the agent could enter, and it would not be necessary for the landlord to accompany this agent whenever entry was needed. That does not mean that a "listing agent" that happens to work with a landlord has an independent right to enter the landlord's property. The same would go for repairmen. It is actually not clear to me whether there could be blanket permission for any and all with access to the lock box to enter, since pretty much any realtor can enter a house for sale, subject to whatever the stated limitations are, and they don't call the owner for each entry. I suspect that one would not have legal grounds for imposing a particular additional restriction on a landlord's right to access and permit access to the property, since there's no overriding statute, and restrictions on landlord access mainly derive from statutes.
australia A tenant must return the property in the state it was given subject to fair wear and tear Fair wear and tear represents the deterioration that occurs in normal use - so it includes wear on a carpet from walking on it but not wear from having a horse walk on it (unless you’re renting a stable but who puts carpet in a stable?) If the wall is in the condition that it was given to you but for the normal deterioration over time, then you are not liable to fix it. As for who has the onus of proof, since the landlord is the one claiming the entitlement, they have to prove it. However, the burden is only the balance of probabilities. So, if there is a fist shaped hole in the plaster wall and there is no evidence it was there when the tenant moved in, then, it’s more likely than not that it happened on the tenant’s watch and they have to fix it. Because putting fists through walls is something that residents are more likely to do than landlords. However, if there is a painted wall and the initial application of the paint is defective, then absent evidence that the tenant painted the wall, it’s more likely than not that the landlord did it. Because painting walls is something landlords are more likely to do than residents.