I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.

I would make th lanlord clean up the mess. If you had the money you
could get it done and take it off of your rent but you don't. Just
tell him to get someone asap. You have rights.

Carpets are ruined if its been days unless ther are not wall to wall and
can be removed and dried right away, There are maybe a thousand types of
mold only a few are bad , unless you feel sick dont worry. The lanlord
is responible for your issues. Cleaning professionaly if its wall to
wall probably wont be enough since the carpet will be wet underneath for
days. contact him demand nicely it is fixed now, you have renters
rights. If its wall to wall best is remove carpet, wash floor with
maybe 25% bleach to kill mold and new carpet.

its the landlords problem, if he doesnt fix it tell him you cant pay
your rent and will see hm in small claimns court

On 14 May 2006 06:01:46 -0700, "
wrote:

its the landlords problem, if he doesnt fix it tell him you cant pay
your rent and will see hm in small claimns court

In New York, renters cannot legally withhold rent payment unless they
can prove the landlord has violated the terms of the lease. If they
have a problem with the landlord that they can't resolve directly,
they need to report the landlord to the local health and building
inspection service. If health and building codes are shown to be in
violation on the property, then the renter can withhold rent, but only
with the reports in hand as documentation of proof.

Your advice would create more problems for the OP if OP is a New York
renter.

landlord shud pay the cost and do it right. North Carolina you cannot hold
back rent but can go to court.
"Driz" wrote in message
ups.com...
I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.

In article . com, Driz says...

I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.


At this point, the carpet needs to be removed and disposed of. (Earlier, the
carpet would need to be removed and dried.) Your landlord is responsible to
repair *all* the damages of flooding affecting the habitability of your
apartment - not just fix the leak.

Contact a local renter's rights organization or Public Interest Research Group
(PIRG, they're named "xxPIRG" where xx is the two-letter abbreviation for your
state). Try a phone call to the landlord - use that word "habitability" -
that's the legal term for his resonsibility to keep the place one that can be
reasonably lived in.

That's assuming you've had a non-compliant landlord. Have you even notified him
or her (or them) of the continuting problem?

Banty


--

"Driz" wrote in message
ups.com...
I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.

I don't disagree with anything anyone else has said, but...

A couple years ago the dishwasher drain clogged and a great deal of water
went through the floor and soaked my basement carpeting.
I should have pulled it up and disposed of it, but am way to cheap to do the
right thing. Like you, I soaked up all the water I could, but also put in a
dehumidifier and a couple fans. It took a few days, but finally dried out.
AFAIK, it is fine.
Maybe the electricity cost more than the carpet, and maybe there is mold
that I don't know about; but it seems to have worked out okay.

On Sun, 14 May 2006 14:35:50 GMT, "Toller" wrote:


"Driz" wrote in message
oups.com...
I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.

I don't disagree with anything anyone else has said, but...

A couple years ago the dishwasher drain clogged and a great deal of water
went through the floor and soaked my basement carpeting.
I should have pulled it up and disposed of it, but am way to cheap to do the
right thing. Like you, I soaked up all the water I could, but also put in a
dehumidifier and a couple fans. It took a few days, but finally dried out.
AFAIK, it is fine.
Maybe the electricity cost more than the carpet, and maybe there is mold
that I don't know about; but it seems to have worked out okay.

I've done the cleaning, bleaching, shampooing and drying three
times over the years after leaks and floods and each time I spent
about $150 and 10 hours of work to save my carpet (and padding).
That effort has saved me thousands of dollars each time. I actually
collected insurance money on one of them.

The only bad thing aboujt it is that I didn't get new carpet....
So now, I'm throwing out my old carpet and laying parquet on the slab.
It is much prettier than carpet, but I grew up on wood floors and
hated them.

In article , WM says...

On Sun, 14 May 2006 14:35:50 GMT, "Toller" wrote:


"Driz" wrote in message
roups.com...
I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.

I don't disagree with anything anyone else has said, but...

A couple years ago the dishwasher drain clogged and a great deal of water
went through the floor and soaked my basement carpeting.
I should have pulled it up and disposed of it, but am way to cheap to do the
right thing. Like you, I soaked up all the water I could, but also put in a
dehumidifier and a couple fans. It took a few days, but finally dried out.
AFAIK, it is fine.
Maybe the electricity cost more than the carpet, and maybe there is mold
that I don't know about; but it seems to have worked out okay.

I've done the cleaning, bleaching, shampooing and drying three
times over the years after leaks and floods and each time I spent
about $150 and 10 hours of work to save my carpet (and padding).
That effort has saved me thousands of dollars each time. I actually
collected insurance money on one of them.

The only bad thing aboujt it is that I didn't get new carpet....
So now, I'm throwing out my old carpet and laying parquet on the slab.
It is much prettier than carpet, but I grew up on wood floors and
hated them.

??

Isn't parquet a wood floor pattern?

Or are you referring to a parquet-look vinyl tile or other vinyl flooring.
Which, BTW, is the best option. That or tile.

Banty


--

Many slumlords are complete jerks. I lived in a below ground level apartment
several years ago and after a heavy rain water began coming in through the
wall. Saturated everything. I was mopping up and running the dehumidifier
when the landlord arrived. "Well, I see your dehumidifier overflowed and
ruined the carpet", he says. I showed him the wall and he said I caused the
problem. I phoned the Housing Authority in the county and they sent an
inspector. Next thing I knew the slumlord sent a check in the mail for my
damaged goods, everything inside was fixed and there was a backhoe outside
digging around the foundation. The county made him put drain pipes in to
alleviate the drainage problem. Better to notify the agency in charge of
housing than to sue. Go get'em.

Bob

"Driz" wrote in message
ups.com...
I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.

Driz wrote:

I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.

Rent a powerful shopvac and get the water up. Then keep fan running
until the carpet and pad is dry. We did this with an area rug when
washing machine hose broke. Area rug was dry in 24 hours. With carpet
pad it is a little iffy, but unless it has been weeks, you probably have
a chance of getting it before the dreaded mold sets in. College
landlords aren't known for good maintenance and generosity, but I would
send him the for the expense. I would also send him a nice letter,
certified mail, informing him so he doesn't dock your security deposit
for the damage. If the floor is wood, then you need time to dry out a
lot of moisture. Keep window open when possible if weather is warm and
dry. In his own interest, the landlord might loan a dehumidifier to
help dry the area before everything rots.

On 14 May 2006 09:49:19 -0700, Banty wrote:

In article , WM says...

On Sun, 14 May 2006 14:35:50 GMT, "Toller" wrote:


"Driz" wrote in message
groups.com...
I rent a small single floor appartment on the ground floor near my
college. A couple of days ago water started appearing around 11pm in
our bathroom tiled area. I soaked it up with towels and went to bed.
When I woke up the water had spread a little bit into our living room
making the squishy sound when you step on it.

Turns out the hot water heater in the Appt above us was busted and
leaking straight down into my roomates carpeted bedroom closet(where
our heater is as well) and spreading through the wall into our bathroom
area and into the living room carpet.

Well the landlord came and fixed their waterheater and the leaking
water has stopped. Its the weekend and everything is closed, i have
been left to fix the flooding myself, but Im in college and cant afford
to call a profesisonal and I don't know what I should be doing.

I have been soaking up the water with towels, then washing them and
soaking them again.

The carpets are now just damp, but now the musty smell seems to be
everywhere.

Im worried about the smell and the horror stories about mold and
mildew. Should I leave? What kind of company should I contact to test
for mold, or clean? What responsibilites does my landlord have to
helping me with this?

Sorry, Im alone and ignorant in all this, and learning a life lesson.

I don't disagree with anything anyone else has said, but...

A couple years ago the dishwasher drain clogged and a great deal of water
went through the floor and soaked my basement carpeting.
I should have pulled it up and disposed of it, but am way to cheap to do the
right thing. Like you, I soaked up all the water I could, but also put in a
dehumidifier and a couple fans. It took a few days, but finally dried out.
AFAIK, it is fine.
Maybe the electricity cost more than the carpet, and maybe there is mold
that I don't know about; but it seems to have worked out okay.

I've done the cleaning, bleaching, shampooing and drying three
times over the years after leaks and floods and each time I spent
about $150 and 10 hours of work to save my carpet (and padding).
That effort has saved me thousands of dollars each time. I actually
collected insurance money on one of them.

The only bad thing aboujt it is that I didn't get new carpet....
So now, I'm throwing out my old carpet and laying parquet on the slab.
It is much prettier than carpet, but I grew up on wood floors and
hated them.

??

Isn't parquet a wood floor pattern?

Or are you referring to a parquet-look vinyl tile or other vinyl flooring.
Which, BTW, is the best option. That or tile.

Banty

No, I now have the real pre-finished ultra-urethane wood parquet, put
down a square foot at a time. Absolutely beautiful to look at, but
I miss my soft carpet where I can lay in front of the tv without
bruising.

Well several days have already passed but it always amazes me how
renters refuse to do anything that costs them some money. Maybe the
landlord won't reimburse you but you still have to live there so $75 or
so to fix the problem doesn't seem like much to pay. You could have
bought a couple box fans for $10 each and used them to dry out the
carpet. If you have a/c, you could have run the a/c for a couple days
and that might have done it. Or you could have hired a carpet cleaning
company for $75 and had them vacuum the carpets dry. For that matter,
a $40 shop vac could have done the job. A few simple steps could have
resolved the problem quickly. You still may want to hire a carpet
cleaning company as they can probably treat the carpet to kill the mold
and vacuum out all excess moisture.

As for your landlord, at the very least you need to document IN WRITING
what has happened and what measures you have taken to fix the problem,
and what you would like the landlord to do, in addition, to fix the
problem or remedy the situation. Keep a copy for yourself. Send it in
a way you can prove the landlord received it. Take pictures or video
of the carpet to document its condition.

For renters rights in Ohio and all states consult
www.ohiolandlordtenant.com