People Share Their Nightmare-Landlord Stories

Renting is something that many people can’t escape – not everyone is fortunate enough to own their own home, after all. In a rental relationship, the tenant pays rent, and the landlord provides a safe, sanitary place to live. But things don’t always happen the way they’re supposed to.

Everything from people living in roach-infested apartments, to dishonest landlords trying to get their grubby paws on security deposits – and worse – have happened, and continue to happen. Some landlords have tried to keep their renters’ belongings, and taken them to court- and that’s not even the half of it. Here, people share the nightmare landlord stories that’ll make you want to save up for your own home and never rent again…

A New Fridge

I lived in a studio apartment while I was in college and had a cheap, worthless landlord. Among the many stories I have, the worst was when my fridge died in May. Given that the apartment was furnished, I called the landlord to let him know. His solution, instead of replacing it, was to bring over a 50-gallon Styrofoam cooler filled with jumbo bags of ice.

I asked how long it’d be before he’d replace it, and he said he was just going to wait until my lease was up – in the beginning of July. I decided to contact an attorney ASAP and got out of the lease, but not before the cheap dude changed the locks, and almost took all of my stuff. I kicked the door in and moved everything off the balcony with three buddies. Reddit user: godbullseye

A Lack of Privacy

My (now) ex, a friend, and I all lived in a house together. We’d been there for almost a year, and were moving out within a month. The house didn’t have air conditioning, and I was six months pregnant. One day, I’m lying naked on my bed with a fan blowing on me. I hear the side door open, and think nothing of it.

My landlord was showing a couple our house without contacting us beforehand, or even knocking. He opened my door and they all walked in my room, and saw me lying there looking like a sweaty beached whale with my legs open, and all my goods on display. I’ve never been more angry and embarrassed in my entire life. Reddit user: smw89

The Pest Problem

My first apartment, when I was 18, had a rat and roach problem. My landlord refused to fumigate or call an exterminator. Instead, he just showed up one day and started opening up the walls looking for the pests. I remember sleeping that night, and I could hear the rats in the walls, which is a sound that doesn’t put you in the sleeping mood.

I’d wake up in the morning and there would be drywall in the kitchen because the rats chewed through and got into the pantry. I refused to pay rent until he called an exterminator. After six weeks or so he told me to move out, and just up and changed the locks, holding all my possessions hostage. Fortunately, I took him to small claims court and won. Reddit user: [redacted]

No Thanks, I’ll Pass

I rented a 500-acre ranch with an old ranch house from a 95-year-old man. He lived in town (small hill country town in Texas) where his live-in nurses cared for him, and the ranch was five minutes outside of town. I was very thankful because the ranch was really pretty and peaceful, and the rent was only $400 month – which was great.

I was in my 30s and I visited the owner in town to show him pictures of what I was doing to the house. I planted a garden, some trees, laid slate tile, etc. I seriously thought we’d become friends, like grandpa-style, because he acted so dang happy to see me. My boyfriend and I’d take him meals from Whataburger, we took him out to eat in town, our families sang Christmas carols to him, etc.

This man was old, but he had full use of his faculties. So when I moved out and went to tell him goodbye, it was sad for me. I was almost crying. That man looked me straight in the eye, and seriously said, “I gotta have ya. At least once. I want to make love to you.” You can’t believe how shocked I was. The man was 98 by then. I said, “Mr. Oldie! I have a boyfriend!” and walked straight out the front door.

His nurse was sitting outside. “I can’t believe what just happened…I can’t even say it.” She asked plainly, “Did he try to hook up with you?” Of course, I said “Yes!” Then she told me that every time people came to visit, she had to wrestle with him to put his pants on. And that part of her duties included returning the various “toys” he ordered. I was never able to think about him the same way again. Reddit user: [redacted]

Served For What?

I had to move in a hurry, so I took the first available flat I could find. I really regret it now. Here’s a brief list of all the stuff the landlord did at that time: First, he sent his brother to do the initial viewing and negotiating. When I accepted and started to move in, the landlord finally showed up in person and quoted a much higher price for the rent.

Second, he refused to produce a tenancy agreement until I withheld rent. Third, he said the tenancy agreement clearly stated that payment included all bills, as in the landlord would collect rent and bill money together as one lump sum. This’ll be important later. Fourth, He’d routinely enter my flat and rummage through my stuff. I later discovered that a silver pocket watch that my mom bought for my 18th birthday was missing.

Fifth, he entered the house every day and stole the mail before anyone could read it. Sixth, when told that the house was totally infested with rats and cockroaches, he said that “this is normal in India.” This isn’t India pal. Seventh, he turned up every other week to collect money for “additional bills” and wouldn’t specify what these bills were. When I refused to give him money, he changed the locks until I paid.

Lastly, the crowning glory of this walking sack of terribleness: he didn’t pay the council tax. As I said, he collected money for all of the bills along with the rent, but apparently failed to actually send this money on to the council. We (the tenants) were taken to court, sued, and lost in our absence. When we failed to pay the entire outstanding debt and court costs, bailiffs were sent to collect.

This was the first time any of us knew that there was a problem. I convinced the bailiffs of what’d happened by showing them my tenancy agreement (which no one else had) and got them to back off. I tried calling the landlord, and found that both of his cell phones had been deactivated. Reddit user: [redacted]

Squirrels, Cat Litter, And Ammonia

The house was terrible and falling down, plus there was a mouse infestation. The landlord heard somewhere that cat litter keeps rodents away. I entered the laundry room one day to discover two inches of scented cat litter everywhere. She (perhaps fortuitously) didn’t realize that it’s used cat litter that keeps away mice, not clean, scented stuff that stank up the entire house.

It remained there for a year, until we moved out. One time, his same landlord attempted to drive to IKEA. The closest one was in NJ, about an hour away. She lived upstairs and after a few days, I realized I hadn’t seen her in a while. It turned out she got lost in NJ, couldn’t find her way back, and ended up just booking a hotel and staying for two days until someone came and got her.

At one point she believed that the house was overrun by squirrels, and would illegally enter our apartment to look for them. She also had all of the blooming trees (the only nice plants in the yard) cut down because of “squirrels.” I’m still not sure what was going on there. Any time I did anything she didn’t like, she’d accuse me of letting squirrels into the house.

Back in the laundry room, I overheard her teaching her son how to do laundry. She warned him to never ever mix bleach and ammonia, because it makes a toxic gas. She then proved this by purposely mixing the two. They instantly started choking and gagging, and abandoned the laundry room to run back upstairs. And get this – she was a mental health professional. Reddit user: [redacted]

Breathing Causes Mildew

I lived in a crappy two-bedroom apartment with no ventilation. It was more like a glorified shoe-box than a house. One day, I get mail from the landlord. She wrote a letter saying that she was walking past the property the other day, and noticed mildew on the corner of the front window. The letter said that this was really bad for the house, and that we had to get rid of it.

This was a little weird and pedantic, but okay, I thought, whatever, I’ll clean it. But the letter went on to say that we should take steps to prevent it from coming back. The letter included a list of things that caused mildew, and recommend that we avoid doing those things. I get to the last item on the list and it was, “Breathing.” Breathing can cause mildew. The landlord tried to ask me to stop breathing in my apartment. Reddit user: [redacted]

Unknown Recordings

I have a live-in landlord who’s one of the worst roommates I’ve ever had. He expects his tenants to do all the chores but never tells us what he wants done – he just expects us to read his mind. He rarely cleans up after himself, and ignores our requests for him not to have his loud friends over when we have work in the morning, or to not leave the bathroom covered in water.

I noticed something that looked like a security camera in our living room a few months back, which I’d always figured was just a wireless speaker. When I asked him about why it had a lens, he claimed that was just part of our security system’s alarm, and the lens was actually a speaker. I looked up the product online and found out that it’s a full home security system that streams audio and video direct to his phone.

He turns it on whenever he leaves, and turns it off when he’s home. He’s never mentioned this to me or the other tenant, and outright lied about it to my face. When home alone, I’ve walked through the living room naked after showering, and my girlfriend has as well, so he’s definitely seen that. But he’s been filming me now for almost a year without my knowledge. Reddit user: [redacted]

An Ex-Landlord Or Ex-Girlfriend

I moved out on Halloween in 2016. Between Oct 31st and December 4th, my ex-landlord emailed me 17 times. Her emails were full of questions about my health, my boyfriend, etc. At first, I tried to only answer what I felt comfortable answering and hoped she got the message; nope – she’d click “reply” and copy and paste the same questions I’d deliberately ignored.

Eventually, I wouldn’t reply to emails with no “business” in them (i.e., no questions directly related to the apartment). To force me to answer, she’d email again and ask for my parents’ mailing address. On December 4th, I blocked her email address. I got a nice reprieve over Christmas and I thought, OK, now I can move on. On January 20th, I got a friend request from her on Facebook. Reddit user: [redacted]

 Doesn’t Matter Who Breached It

One apartment I rented had on the lease that they paid water and sewer. Three months in the water was cut off because they didn’t pay the bill, and they insisted that it was a mistake to put it on the lease, and I needed to pay it. I ended up having to pay for the water and sewer, but then when I moved out, they billed me $1,500 for breach of contract.

Seems the clause in the contract stated, “In the event of a breach of contract the renter will be liable for a $1,500 breach of contract fee.” When I pointed out they were the ones in breach of contract, they replied, “The clause has nothing to do with who breached the contract, it only states that you’re responsible for the breach of contract fee.” Reddit user: [redacted]

$1500 To Throw Away A Chandelier

I subleased a room from my friend one summer while he did an internship. His three roommates were also out of town the entire summer, but paid rent and their portion of the utilities for the summer. At the end of my sublease, I cleaned the house, moved my stuff out, and turned in my key.

Three months later, I get served with a lawsuit for over $5,000, alleging excessive damages and cleaning fees. I sent them back a letter demanding an itemized list of all the fees I was being sued for. When I get the itemized list, it was absolutely stupid.

For example, they’d charged me a $500 “chandelier cleaning charge,” to clean the overhead light in the dining room; then a $300 “chandelier maintenance fee;” and then a $700 “chandelier replacement charge.”  $1,500 to clean, maintain, and then throw away a chandelier? Nope.

They also, obviously, completely fluffed their expenses, charging me something like $25 to replace a light bulb in the basement, and charging me $750 for two hours of “lawn maintenance,” which was the responsibility of the landlord in the lease anyway.

It turns out they also had ended up filing a separate lawsuit against each of us, so they were actually suing us all for $25,000 total for what couldn’t have been more than $1,000 worth of expenses, which would’ve been covered by our security deposit anyway.

Anyway, I work for the Housing Department of my city and sent them a response on my office letterhead, saying that I refused to pay for the damages, and that they could come and get me if they wanted to try. I never got a response, but the suit was dropped and I promptly advised the city to deny them any future city contracts. Reddit user: [redacted]

The Outdoor Concerts

Before I started renting, I was promised a unit in a quiet area of the building. That wasn’t the case – far from it, in fact. They held outdoor concerts outside my window all summer. It drove me absolutely crazy. They wouldn’t let me move out before my lease was over, without a penalty of two months’ rent, and forfeiting the security deposit.

They also towed my car from the resident parking lot two days before I moved out for having a flat tire (no notice given). And when they did it, it was to the farthest auto shop in town, when there was a shop right across the street. Yeah, towing companies charge by the mile. And I was the one who had to pay the bill. Reddit user: [redacted]

Cutting The Power

It was an apartment complex, and this one stands out still. When we were looking at the place, the landlord assured us that they had a great reputation. Less than one month in, they didn’t pay the power bill. Not, “they forgot to pay the power.” Not, “they were in financial trouble.” They just wanted to see if they could call the power company’s bluff about disconnection.

The power company killed the power, and proceeded to lock half the breakers in every building. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a riot take shape, but try cutting off the AC and refrigeration for a few dozen Alabamians in the middle of June, during a heat wave. It was crazy how fast they tried to pay the company once people were almost out with their pitchforks. Reddit user: [redacted]

Unwanted Renovations

My landlord knew I was a clean and quiet tenant who loved baking. He “renovated” and removed the stove while moving the “kitchen” (cupboards, sink, and fridge) to the other wall. He replaced the stove with a toaster oven, and acted like the stove had never even existed. He also removed my living room door. He increased my rent by 30% for those “renovations.”

We’ve been in legal hearings ever since, and now he’s trying to keep my damage deposit out of spite, because I hung shelves (no storage in bathroom) and curtains (huge window almost to the floor by the toilet, which faces a busy street), and a few pictures. The neighbor upstairs flooded three apartments and kept their deposit, so what’s the big deal? Reddit user: [redacted]

The Creep

My fiancée and I used to live on the same property as our creepy landlord, and we paid rent directly to his dad. For many reasons, we decided that the place was no longer a good fit for us – one of which was because he (the dad) used to show up at night wanting to hang out, and talk about the weirdest things.

A week before we were due to leave, the son showed up at 11:00 pm claiming his dad had never seen a dollar of the money we’d been paying him, and he was threatening to block in our car. I gave him the details of the bank account I’d been paying into, and he went back to check. He came back later to tell us his dad had forgotten he had that account. Reddit user: [redacted]

Or We’ll Take You To Court

We paid rent with electricity, gas, and water added on each month. One day, our power goes out. I call the power company, and they tell me no one has paid the electricity bill in six months. Even though we were giving our landlord money to cover the electricity the whole time we lived there, which had been about six months at the time.

Imagine my shock when I heard that, knowing that I also had the receipts from the landlord to prove it. I call him up and he says he’ll fix it, it must be a mistake. Two weeks later, I’m threatening to take him to court, and our power comes back on. That’s good because I have no legal experience, and had no idea what taking him to court would entail. Reddit user: [redacted]

Additional Charges

When I was an undergrad student, my landlord was some big shot lawyer who rented out a house to college students. Then, without fail, he’d take their security deposit at the end of the lease, and send an itemized list of all the additional charges they’d accrued. Often times they were completely made up, and made no sense at all.

We only stopped him from charging us an arm and a leg, or taking us to court, when we realized that one thing he put on the itemized list was a “lamp – $50, to help in repainting.” This was illegal, because he was just buying things for his personal use. When we told him this, he shut up pretty quick, and left us alone after that. Reddit user: [redacted]

Keeping The Deposit

I once had a landlady do our walkthrough and agree, in writing, that there was no damage to our property, and that we’d be getting all of our deposit back when we returned our keys. Two weeks later we got a letter stating they were keeping all of the security deposit because someone had gotten drunk, destroyed a screen in the window, gouged a hole in the wall, and dented the refrigerator.

This occurred two days after we moved out. It turns out that she used the property as a place for her in-laws to stay over during Thanksgiving, and fully expected us to pay for their damages because our name was still on the lease. The judge was really hung up on why other occupants were in our apartment without our knowledge or consent, if the woman’s position was that it was still our apartment and therefore we were liable. Reddit user: golemsheppard2

He Ghosted

The end of the lease was approaching, and we informed our landlord we weren’t going to be able to renew. We had trouble finding a new place. We eventually found one, but it was only available four months after the end of our lease. It was a two bedroom and our roommate was on his way out, so the landlord said we could stay the four months at a reduced rent. Good guy, right?

The time came to move out; we cleaned meticulously, shampooed the carpet, baseboards – the whole nine yards. About two months after we moved out, I contacted our old landlord about our security deposit, which hadn’t been returned yet. He claimed he applied it to our rent, there were damages in the apartment, and we’d broken a banister in the stairwell. Well, I had time-stamped photos before and after moving, and a check-out form signed by the management.

I also had a notarized statement from a neighbor who’d seen who broke the banister. Plus the fact is that in Illinois, any supposed damages have to be repaired and a bill presented; also, security deposits cannot be used as rent in any fashion. I took that guy to court, won, got a judgment for three times our security deposit, and he ghosted. Never did see the money. Reddit user: div4ide

What The Heck, Man

We were moving, and paid an extra month of rent so we could move at our own pace. Some may have called it excessive, but we wanted to be comfortable. We got a call from our soon to be ex-neighbor that the landlord had gone into the house and taken a bunch of stuff out (including a desktop computer that contained our family pictures).When we called to ask what the heck he was doing, the landlord claimed we’d left all that stuff behind.

He also said he was going to charge us because he had to haul it to the dump. We were stunned! My husband lost it and reminded him, in pretty colorful terms, that we’d paid for the whole month, and we weren’t finished moving yet. He did go and get the items from the dump, thankfully. No apology though, and we had to fight him to return our security deposit. Reddit user: faerie03

Throwing Me Out While I Was On Vacation

I went out of town on a camping trip that lasted four days and three nights, and I didn’t have cell service. At the time I had two cats, and so I gave a friend my key in order to come in and feed the cats for me, and make sure they had water and all that jazz. You know, the standard.

While I was out of town, the landlord thought I broke my lease agreement and sublet the place to somebody, threw most of my stuff into the parking lot, and changed the locks. Thankfully my friend was there to take the cats, and what she could of my belongings, to her house until I got back from my little trip.

When I got into town I had around 17 voicemails from the landlord – all with her yelling at me. When I went to talk to her, she said she had to do that because giving my key to somebody else is a safety hazard for the tenants, even though it wasn’t like a key to a larger building where you could then get to other people’s apartments.

My apartment was a ground-level corner with its own entry. I’ve never been so mad. She then tried to get me to move out early and when I agreed, she tried to charge me extra. When I did move out, she didn’t give me back any of my deposit, AND charged me an additional $200 for minuscule things. Reddit user: [redacted]

The Broken A/C

While I was deployed, my wife remained at our home in Texas. The A/C broke in the middle of summer. They told her that the temperature wasn’t hot enough to justify a repair. When she showed them pictures of the thermostat reading over 100 degrees indoors, they finally said that they’d send a repairman, but that I needed to be there because I was the primary name on the lease, although she had power of attorney.

I threatened to sue. A/C was eventually jerry-rigged (the repair guy told her that he was paid to do the bare minimum fix) near the end of summer. Fast forward. I’m home, it’s getting hot again, and the A/C breaks again. Same story as before, claiming it wasn’t hot enough. This dragged on for a while, and I finally got orders to move to a new duty station.

I gave them 30 days notice and moved out. They tried to tell me that I couldn’t leave the home with a broken air conditioner, and wouldn’t honor my military orders. I had to pay to fix the A/C, and wouldn’t get my deposit back. I once again threatened to sue, and contacted the actual owner of the house. He was a cool dude living in New York, and said he’d take care of it for me.

He flew all the way in from New York City to see me in Texas, fired the property managers, sued them himself for something or other, said I was actually the cleanest/most responsible tenet he’d had, and eventually paid me double my security deposit for my troubles. He ended up being a really nice guy. Reddit user: [redacted]

Crazy Really Means Crazy

My “crazy” landlord actually turned out to be crazy. She was committed about a year into our tenancy, and it wasn’t a surprise as she did bizarre things, like show up and start gardening in the middle of the night, or call to say she knew that we’d sold all her light fixtures (we hadn’t – they were all still attached to the ceiling like always).

About six months after we moved out, she must’ve been released because she called me at 3:00 am to scream at me for stealing a chest freezer from the garage when we moved out (there was never a freezer there). I’m so glad to own a house now, and I hope I never have to go back to renting. Reddit user: [redacted]

 Random Pop Ups

This landlord would randomly come in the apartment around 9:00 pm saying he came to take out the trash. He gave spare keys to his father and the cleaning lady, and both kept randomly coming inside without any notification. He also forgot to mention that the garage directly under my room was actually a workshop, and he’d work there in the early morning/late night hours.

The final straw was when he came into the apartment at 8:00 am on a Saturday, and brought his wife and small son into my absent roommate’s room for several hours. I knew this because I was trying to sleep in the next room, but couldn’t because they were entertaining themselves. To this day, I still wonder if he was a sociopath, or just a complete jerk. Reddit user: [redacted]

New Potential Tenants

My best friend and I rented a duplex two years ago for $1,200 a month. It was a two bed, two bath home, which was a decent place for two 20 year olds. But it needed a few things – simple fix type stuff. We both are kind of handymen, so we fixed the sink and redid the back and front lawn, resealed the driveway (he worked at Lowes, and we got stuff very cheap) and more.

Anyway our landlord came over three months into the lease, and said, “Well Eatinbeav, I have new potential tenants for this spot. I gotta charge you $400 more a month, or evict you boys.” After we got over the initial shock of it, we both got the heck out. The duplex is vacant now, and gone to absolute trash. We couldn’t believe the audacity. Reddit user: EatinBeav

Stop Coming By Unannounced

The landlady would constantly come by unannounced, and would just let herself in with her key, without even knocking. I’m not sure if this was illegal, but it surely felt like an infringement of my rights. It was irritating, but since we had nothing to hide it, we didn’t want to make a big issue of it. Until the day she brought her husband around to do some maintenance (unasked for).

As all of us living there were girls, and we never thought twice about walking from the bathroom to our bedrooms in just a towel, and I ended up being trapped in the bathroom for half an hour (I had no intention of walking past him in a skimpy towel) while this old man fiddled with something right outside the door. Reddit user: zinzidec

The Crazy Vet

When I was living in a rooming house, my landlord was this crazy Vietnam vet. He had a plastic-looking fake eye that would weird me out all the freaking time, and he was obsessed with watching the security cameras. Since this was a rooming house, it technically counted as a hotel, and you didn’t have the renters’ rights you enjoy in apartments. He had a taser, loved to threaten to tase people, and did so several times.

So, if you were late with your rent, he’d change the lock or your room, take all of your stuff, toss it in garbage bags, and then just leave it out by the door. He’d leave notes with misspellings all over the property for the most insane reasons. Once he got pissed off at a guy who lived there, refused his rent, packed his stuff up, and stole the remote control for his TV. Reddit user: dizzyelk

Not A Very Child-Friendly Conversation

When I was a kid, my dad lived in a different state from my mom and me – for financial reasons. The landlord was nice-ish when we moved in; I talked about how we were going to move in with my dad as soon as we could. The landlord started telling 6-year-old me that my parents were divorced, and I was never going to live with my dad (not true).

My mom worked in a factory, and had a lot of guy friends who would come over and fix things in the house, have bonfires with us, and bring their own kids over to play. The landlord started calling my mom a prostitute to everyone on the block, including her and me. My dad had to call him and tell him off for being an idiot.

The next day, eviction notices were posted on every window and door of the house. Within two days, we were loading a moving truck, and the landlord threatened to call the cops on us for the eyesore. My mom called the cops instead for harassment; the officer stayed with us for hours making sure our landlord let us carry on with our move peacefully. Reddit user: CausticMoose

No Painting For Nine Days

We moved into our apartment only a few hours after the previous tenants moved out. I’m not even sure who scheduled the time-frames to be this close. Our building management company is very religious, and they refused to paint it that first weekend because it was a little known—but supposedly very important—yearly celebration, and therefore they could not work until the following weekend.

So, for the first nine days, we had to live with all of our furniture, boxes, and belongings pushed up in the center of each room, which meant we couldn’t unpack, or even move around. We refused to unpack and risk getting paint on our things. Sleeping on the one small sliver of my bed that wasn’t covered by boxes and suitcases got old very quickly. Reddit user: [redacted]

All About The Smoke

I decided to find a new place to live. In the move-out process, the landlady demanded I use a specific carpet cleaning company, so I did. They clean the entire carpet, and I pay their $500 fee. When the landlady came by to do the final check she, A) smelled like a chimney and, B) said she’d have to call the carpet place to do it again, because the carpet wasn’t clean enough.

I paid $500, and the carpet wasn’t clean enough? We continue on with the check. At one point she mentions something about it smelling like dogs, and my husband said, ‘Maybe it’s the smoke,’ (referring to how she smelled). She got pretty quiet after that comment, and we finished up the look-around with no other issues. Later, when I got what remained of my security deposit back, she said they had to keep the cleaning ladies there longer because it smelled like smoke.

We’d never smoked in that house. Ever. She was being completely serious. When I asked her what she was talking about, she brought up the comment my husband made. About her. Which I then got to explain to her. When I asked her who her supervisor was to report her utter and complete nonsense, she said we could take it to small claims court. Reddit user: jaxinthebox14

Not Worth The Effort

My sister had a horrible landlord. The landlord refused to give back the $800 deposit because they got a portable dishwasher (which required no installation, the landlord could’ve just gotten rid of it if she didn’t want it) and left it there when they moved, saying she could have it if she wanted. Meaning, my sister just gave her a dishwasher for free.

They argued and argued until finally the landlord said, “Okay, well you’re only getting $300 back because of the time and effort this caused me.” When she sent the deposit in a money order, she gave them $295, because apparently stamps and envelopes weren’t included in the $500 she took away from them. They didn’t even call; they didn’t want to deal with her. Reddit user: [redacted]

An Overall Crappy Landlord

I had a landlord whose maintenance guy used his key to steal some of our things. We filed a police report and notified the landlord, just because we wanted him to know since he owned a lot of properties in the area, and didn’t want other people who lived in his buildings to be victims.

Not because we were blaming him. But a few weeks later, he made a huge deal about it, like threatening legal action, and made a big stink about us having a loud party one time – which, compared to other parties we’d heard in the building, wasn’t that loud at all.

Fast forward a few months; my roommate and I decided we wanted to break the lease, because the neighborhood was really getting pretty bad. We knew we’d most likely be forfeiting our down payment, but our neighbor, who happened to be the landlord’s nephew was at a party with us.

He let slip that the guy jacking everyone’s stuff was employed by the landlord. Needless to say, we were able to end the lease early after we had a frank discussion with the landlord about his employee helping himself to our stuff. Reddit user: hamsteaked

One Too Many Sues

My mom’s landlord went into foreclosure in 2009, and she had to move out. The landlord took photos of the house with trash everywhere, and sued my mom for $15k, claiming that he spent nearly 50 hours cleaning – and charged the hourly rate he was billing in his job as a consultant. This was wrong for so many reasons on so many levels.

My mom lawyered up, and they went through all the pictures and found it was the same trash dumped in different places. The same bag would be in the kitchen, bedroom and backyard. Anyway, he had to pay my mom back the full deposit, all her legal fees, and was placed on the “vexatious litigants” list, which means he’s basically no longer allowed to sue people. Reddit user: ElToberino

Going Easy On The Security Deposit

When we moved in, we paid the security deposit, the first and half of last month’s rent. We have emails from our landlord acknowledging that we did so, and he cashed the checks for that amount. However, now that it’s the last month, they’re trying to say that because the lease didn’t say we needed to pay last month, he wants the full last month’s rent.

We said we’d pay the remaining half of the month – which we owe – and would fulfill the total amount of the lease. When we said this, he said, “Just pay the full month, and I’ll go easy on the security deposit,” implying that he’s going get his money out of that one way or another. So even if we fight it, he can screw us with the security deposit. Reddit user: Flannel_Channel

The Creepiest Of Them All

This one landlord was just a really strange dude; very socially awkward, and he creeped out all the girls in the building. He lived next door to the building I was renting a room in. We had to go to his room to pay the rent, and he’d sit at his table and position his debit machine so you had to bend over right in his face.

He was very fond of tickling female tenants whenever he stopped by. We found him sleeping on our couch on several occasions, and a few times he took a bath in one of the bathrooms. Once I woke up to find him in my room – he claimed he was checking the window to see if it needed replacing. Reddit user: ihopeyoulikeapples

Never Rent From Family

After my mother died (I was just out of college) I moved in with my grandmother, who had a duplex with available space. At the time, I was really just going through the motions. But living with her was the worst. She didn’t understand the concept of privacy, or why I locked the door between areas. She was super Christian, so I wasn’t allowed to have my girlfriend over.

After she ‘accidentally’ opened a letter from my work, she decided my rent should go up (she doubled it). After mentioning opening another person’s mail is illegal, she told me the police would always side with a ‘little old lady.’ The final straw was coming home and finding her entertaining the neighbors and their kids in my living room, playing with some freshly-opened rare collectibles. I haven’t talked to her in the five years since I left. Reddit user: [redacted]

Chemical Hell

Our landlady was old, like 90. She was a sweet, sweet lady. One time we went over to help her clean the hardwood floors before we got carpet laid and moved in. We scraped off mildew and mold (yes, safely) for about six hours one night. We tossed the mold into a bucket of water so it didn’t dry out and spore. We decided to dispose of it the next day.

So, we come back the next day and the bucket is gone. Well, little ole’ Betty decided the bushes out front needed some water, so she took the bucket of moldy water and some chemicals and heave-hoed it over the porch into the bushes. I was surprised the bushes survived the chemical hell they’d just received. Also, she’d continually forget we paid the rent and demand money, otherwise she’d sue us. Fun lady. Reddit user: [redacted]

The Landlady From Hell

The last landlord I had did several things over the nine months I lived there. First, things would break and she’d just refuse to fix them. Things like the washer/dryer, garage door opener, and there was some electrical sparking in the walls – nothing got fixed until I refused to pay rent until she did. She fixed everything, but made thinly veiled threats before doing so.

Once she asked if she could go into the detached garage while I was out of town, and I said she could. She actually went into my house and flipped the breaker off and on a few times repeatedly – to this day I have no idea why. This killed several electronics of mine, and she told me to prove it when confronted.

When I moved out I gave her a PO Box, instead of where I’d actually moved to. She threatened to have people find me if I didn’t give her my actual address. She then moved without a forwarding address, and refused to return my deposit, knowing I’d need to hire an investigator to serve her to get it. Reddit user: firemogle

The Leak

I had a ceiling leak that grew and grew and grew. Eventually, it ended up all over the living room, and made the room unusable. The landlord put an industrial fan in there to dry it out, but took FOREVER to actually fix the problem. I can’t remember how long, but my roommate and I were confined to our rooms, and unable to use the majority of the place we were paying for.

We thought we should get some forgiveness on rent for this. He didn’t. So we simply stopped paying and moved out. He threatened to ‘take legal action’ if we didn’t pay the back rent, but knowing the guy, we figured he was full of it. I had a lawyer friend reach out to him on our behalf, and he totally stopped all contact. Reddit user: anschburman

Gone To The Rats

My wife and I moved into a small basement. A couple of weeks later, we started hearing something in the walls. I figured it was just mice (pretty common here), told the landlord, and moved on. A couple weeks later, I realized it was definitely not mice. We got some big traps and caught six rats really quickly – one with its head eaten off. Another, my wife had to kill because it was caught in the trap, but not dead.

I come home one day, and the landlord says he’s found a new tenant to move in – we’re gone. But you know what he was doing? He wasn’t putting the rat traps back: he hid them all so that the new tenant wouldn’t realize the problem. We had no way to directly contact the new person, but we sent them a letter after we moved out to let them know. Reddit user: allie-the-cat