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Negotiating rent... [Jan. 29th, 2009|09:18 am]
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Ok, so I could use some advice:

A month or two after we moved into this house, they had to start doing some construction work. Legally mandated due to previous construction screw-ups that impacted other houses here. As part of this work, they had to tear out our backyard (a little 10x10 plot that was kind of walled in, no grass but nice stonework), seal up our backyard, and seal off our deck (above the backyard and no longer structurally sound, according to city inspectors). This gives us no private "outdoors" places we can go to. They also tore out our driveway and even our front porch for a couple weeks...that's better now, but the missing backyard and deck is still an issue for who knows how long.

It's a three story townhouse, I think 3 bed 2.75 bath. Rent's around $1400. What I want to figure out is, what's a reasonable amount to try and get the rent lowered by? What's a tiny-little-backyard and a deck generally worth? I really have no guidelines for this kind of thing. The owner (well, PM) sounds like he's willing to talk--he didn't even know about this beforehand--but I want to have some idea before I go in.
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Comments:
[User Picture]From: [info]kittrel
2009-01-29 05:33 pm (UTC)

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I'm on this community called Poor_Skills: http://community.livejournal.com/poor_skills/

They have a lot of people who are active who have experience dealing with rent/landlord issues from all over the country. (I see posts about it all the time) Maybe you should check them out! Someone may have some good advice.
[User Picture]From: [info]karlotta
2009-01-30 04:36 pm (UTC)

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I think the main thing would be to ask for more than you expect/want to get. If you wanted to figure out a "fair" amount to ask for, I suppose you could go math nerdy and figure out what percentage of square footage you didn't have access to.

Also, you could try and butter them up and mention things like you always pay the rent on time or early (if you do!) and you never call them to come fix things because you're responsible people who don't break things. Or if there are any other annoying things going on that you normally wouldn't mention, say you have to jiggle the toilet handle, you could bring those up.

And if you happen to not be under a lease and could move out at any time, you could mention that ominously.