Oven Question

My sister let it slip that either my family is going to get me an oven for Christmas or get my current one fixed. She has a habit of lying so I'm not sure whether I believe her or not, but anyway. The reason for the oven is because my current one doesn't work. When we first tried to use it last November, it filled the house with the smell of gas (heated up the oven though) and set off the alarm. We saw a gas line sitting next to the oven and figured something wasn't hooked up right. The guys came to do the gas lines anyway so we figured they'd see it and they'd fix it. After they left we didn't see the exposed gas line anymore and figured the oven was fixed, but never used it anyway since we had gone so long without it. Well summer rolled around and we had to bake a birthday cake for our friend, so we turned on the oven and it started to heat up but filled the house with smoke and set off the alarms. We turned it off and haven't used it since. Then we tried making pancakes on the stove one morning and even though it was sitting on one of the lowest settings it was burning the pancakes within seconds and leaving the insides still doughy. Then the pan began to pop on the stove, as if the burner was too hot, even though it was sitting on 2. I talked to a co-worker and she said it sounds like the stove doesn't know what setting I'm turning it to. We can still make pasta and rice since those require higher settings anyway, but all in all, our oven and stove sucks.

I was told that in an apartment, you can replace any appliance as long as you keep the original and reinstall it before you leave. Is this true? And where do you keep the original. While I want a new oven, I don't exactly want the old one sitting in my living room and I don't think I can fit it in the downstairs storage area. Even if my sister is lying, I will hopefully get one for myself this year since I just can't stand the one we have now (I am wanting to bake soooo bad this year. I'm really getting the itch to make cookies and pies). Just wondering how I should go about this without making the landlords unhappy.

Shouldn't your landlord be responsible for fixing or getting you a new stove? That would be my first phone call.

I am a Maintenance Supervisor. Call your landlord, its their problem, not yours to fix or replace. IF they dont.....get the local housing people involved.

We tried. They officially don't care about any repairs. When we first moved in, we had a door that you had to shut just right in order for it to actually shut. We wrote it on the report. Their response "Door closes fine.", when they did the "repairs". We also had a clogged drain in the upstairs bathroom. Their response "Added Draino". (We later found the problem was actually a toothbrush that had fallen in there from the previous renter.) We also noted that they had given us carpet instead of hardwood (They had assured us this unit was hardwood since we have cats that like to scratch carpet. We moved in and....carpet..They didn't even contact us back about that.) We also noted that our toilet runs on occasion when you flush it (about 50% of the time it will continue to run) they responded "Toilet runs fine". Obviously, they flushed it once and it didn't run.

When we put in a repair request for the oven and a leaking toilet, a man was out the next day to fix our toilet but that was August 1st that we put in the request and no one has come out to fix our oven. We are going to talk to them when we go to pay rent this week.

Sounds like a call to the housing authority is in order. And probably a move.

Sorry you are having so much trouble up there.

Are you sure that the appliances are included in the lease?

If your renting they should be covered.......if not they shouldnt have been there in the first place.

How do you mean, included in the lease?

And we don't want to move. This place is cheap and will allow us to save money for a house. I can live without an oven but it would be nice to have for the holidays.

In your lease it would say "Tenant to pay for appliance repairs" or the like. I highly doubt thats the case though. I have been doing this for almost 20 years and have never heard of any apartments doing that. (apartments, condos, etc.) Houses for rent maybe.....

Appliance repairs are their responsibility but they fail to do that I guess. We looked through the lease and there is nothing in there about replacing the appliance yourself. It does say that improvements are not allowed unless you have their permission (this includes painting for some reason, but the lady at the office said we were allowed to paint as long as we painted it back to white before leaving).

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Originally Posted by Nightmare Creatures

Sounds like a call to the housing authority is in order. And probably a move.

Sorry you are having so much trouble up there.

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I completely agree. Go to your states Consumers Affairs board online and see what your rights as a tenant are. I believe you will find that the landlord is responsible for timely repairs.

it varies state to state but if you have contacted them about repairs needed on non luxury items and they refuse then you can with-hold rent till repairs have been made. you will have to pay back rent once they fix them tho.

not sure if im allowed to say this here but if you hit up www.lawyers.com you can post a question there and it will be answered by lawyers in the field of the question asked, they can steer you in the best direction to go.

Another option would be to replace the stove and take it out of your rent. I've heard this was legal, if you've notified your landlord and they have not fixed the problem. In this issue, it's not a luxury item and may also be considered a safety problem.