When You're The Noisy Neighbor
Written by dan the roommate man
Thanks to home offices, computer/game rooms and improved entertainment centers, Americans are spending more and more time enveloped in home activities. While having access to all that we need under our own roof is convenient, it can also be noisy.If you live in an apartment or condominium community, you share most of your walls with neighbors. Because of this, you should be extra careful about amount of noise you make. If neighbors have made complaints about noise coming from your apartment, there are certain things you can do to avoid that eviction notice. Place vibration mounts under major appliances: You can find these at your local hardware or appliance store. This will absorb some of sound normally caused by vibrations of your washing machine/refrigerator/washer/dryer etc. Place foam pads under small appliances: These work in same way that vibration mounts do - just on a smaller level. Use window drapes: fabric absorbs sound, so more of it you use, less noisy your home will be. Most leases have a clause stating that floors must have 90% carpet coverage for this reason. Seal holes or cracks in doors and windows: For doors, you can purchase regular weather stripping from a hardware store. You can use this stripping indoors as well as on doors leading outside. This is a great solution to a noisy laundry room or bathroom. To seal windows, you can use inexpensive clear caulking. Replace metal garbage cans with plastic cans: This is pretty obvious. The smaller area, more concentrated noise becomes. If you have metal or aluminum garbage cans banging around, sound will be much more intense than a plastic container.
| | What Tenants Need To Do To Make Repair RquestsWritten by dan the roommate man
One of advantages to living in a rental unit is presence of a landlord. It's a nice treat not to have to worry about finding a reliable handyman to make needed repairs. As a tenant, you hardly ever have to worry about being handed an unreasonably large bill for fixing a leak, etc. Your landlord is responsible for seeing that repairs are made in your unit in a timely fashion. You are responsible for turning in a proper repair request in a timely fashion.So what is a proper repair request? Firstly, it should ALWAYS be on paper... and it's much better if you can turn them in to your landlord typed instead of scrawled out in illegible chicken scratch. In order to avoid future complications i.e.. Your landlord saying “You never told me that needed to be fixed, and now kitchen's burned up! You are going to have to pay for damages to your unit!” you'll want to make a copy of repair request for yourself. The Cleveland Tenant's Organization provides several form letters for tenants to turn in to their landlords. These are great examples of what letter to your landlord should look like. Click here for repair request sample. It's very important to make sure that request has time and date on it. You might consider sending request through mail to guarantee that it ends up in right hands. In any case, letter should be sent to same address and person that you send your rent checks to. If landlord contacts you and says repairs will be made on a certain date, you should follow up this agreement with a letter of confirmation. That way, you'll have written promise for your records. Document exactly what landlord said would be done and when this will take place. Then both you and landlord should sign letter. Like request, give one copy of this letter to your landlord, and keep one for yourself.
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