Q: I informed my landlord in January 2012 that my HVAC unit was leaking and causing water damage that led to a severe mold and mildew infestation. She refused to have the unit inspected by a licensed HVAC inspector as instructed by the Code Enforcement Police in March 2012. The violations were not repaired until after I filed a claim in magistrate court on August 2012, but the HVAC unit still has not been inspected by a licensed inspector. Can I sue the landlord for money I paid towards rent while the code violation was not repaired?
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It entirely depends on where you live. Consult Legal Aid or another service that does pro-bono work for low-income people if you can't afford to hire your own lawyer. A lawyer that knows the laws where you live will be much better able to assist you than random design enthusiasts on a blog will.
Most likely no. You should have renters insurance.
The laws on this sort of thing vary greatly state by state. You need to find out what the laws in your area are.
My guess is that if the apartment was uninhabitable, the landlord would have had to pay to put you up in another apartment or a motel while repairs were being made.
At this point, I suspect that the landlord might be fined by the city or state, but that no money would come directly to you.
It depends on where you live, but here in California functional heat is a requirement for a rental house. Mold (black toxic mold) would also be a situation that would make the unit uninhabitable. Since you already have paid the rent, you would need to sue to get the money back. If you have documentation of all your complaints, letters, repairs, etc. you would probably win in small claims court here. You could sue for each months rent, or bring a separate lawsuit for any repair costs that you paid, or missed work due to waiting for inspectors or contractors. Suing people is painful though, your landlord may start to harass you -- at the very least, they will be looking for ways to evict you going forward. It also continues the anger about the situation - it's hard to move on with your life when you are still reliving the situation via court paperwork and appearance dates. Sometimes it's better to just chalk up your losses to a lesson learned and move on.
Here in San Francisco, there is a tenant's union that provides information about tenants rights and ways to deal with landlords. Maybe you have something similar where you live. http://www.sftu.org