I’ve got six days to either sign this lease extension or find somewhere else to live, and I just realized I have no idea what I actually have the right to demand from my landlord. This isn’t some hypothetical thing — I work freelance and my income verification looks messy on paper, so any move could take months I don’t have. My current rental agreement has a clause about “reasonable access for repairs” but my super lets himself in whenever he feels like it, and the lease says “landlord may enter with 24 hours notice” but also says “tenant shall not unreasonably withhold access,” which feels like it cancels the notice part out.
I already tried calling 311 and they basically read the housing code at me without telling me if my specific wording actually means anything. I also spent two hours on the city’s tenant rights website and found a PDF from 2017 about rent stabilization that doesn’t apply to my building anyway. I paid a paralegal $150 to look at the lease and she said the entry clause was “aggressive but probably enforceable,” which is not exactly reassuring. Maybe I’m overthinking this, but I can’t tell if “reasonable notice” in my state means 24 hours or just whenever because the tenant already agreed to not block it.
The real question: if I push back on the super letting himself in and he stops doing any maintenance for the last month of my lease, is there any way to use the lease terms to force him without ending up in court for weeks? Or do I just accept it, sign the extension, and install a second lock that technically violates the lease?
I already tried calling 311 and they basically read the housing code at me without telling me if my specific wording actually means anything. I also spent two hours on the city’s tenant rights website and found a PDF from 2017 about rent stabilization that doesn’t apply to my building anyway. I paid a paralegal $150 to look at the lease and she said the entry clause was “aggressive but probably enforceable,” which is not exactly reassuring. Maybe I’m overthinking this, but I can’t tell if “reasonable notice” in my state means 24 hours or just whenever because the tenant already agreed to not block it.
The real question: if I push back on the super letting himself in and he stops doing any maintenance for the last month of my lease, is there any way to use the lease terms to force him without ending up in court for weeks? Or do I just accept it, sign the extension, and install a second lock that technically violates the lease?
