My boyfriend and I have lived in our apartment for almost three months. One of our light fixtures has not worked since we moved in and about a week after moving in, the built-in soap dish broke off from the shower, leaving a small area of exposed drywall. We brought up both of theses issues to the landlord immediately and he kind if made it seem like neither is a big deal and has not repaired them.
The light fixture thing is mildly annoying but I don't really care. I'm not sure why he is not concerned about the soap dish, because I imagine it will cause considerable water damage to the drywall.
When we rented the apartment, it was advertised as two car parking. Luckily we both have compact cars or they would not be able to fit. Even so, I park inches away from our neighbor's fence and have to squeeze into and out of my car, and my boyfriend parks inches from the corner of the house. Last week, my boyfriend hit the protruding end of the gutter with his front bumper and knocked it off. Our landlord has been harassing us about fixing the gutter before it rains and we just haven't had time (we both work full time and our landlord is unemployed so he easily could have had it done). He is concerned about the rain causing damage to the foundation although realistically, the end of the gutter curves out far enough away from the house and onto the driveway that it wouldn't be a problem. And, he doesn't seem to care much about the water damage our missing soap dish is causing.
I am a little bit unclear as to who is actually responsible for fixing the gutter. Our lease, and the laws, state that the lessee is responsible for any damage caused to the leased premises. However, laws also state that the lessor is responsible for maintaining and repairing structural and weather-proofing aspects of the building, which I imagine would include the gutter. I suppose I am looking for more clarity on what exactly constitutes the "leased premises". It is my understanding that we would be responsible for what is inside our doors and nothing more. We are not trying to get out of repairing something we clearly broke, just hoping not to be held liable for structural damage that probably already exists if we aren't able to get it fixed before the next rain.
Any insight??