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building code
Mar. 17th, 2013 11:47 pmSovay and I are going through our apartment. We want to have a list of our concerns before the housing inspector turns up. So the inspector doesn't look at the terrifying windows, then go away without seeing the dubious back door. When we actually sit down with the building code, there turns out to be a LOT of dubious around here.
At least we don't have raccoons. Or squirrels. Or daleks. (We're on the second floor. I suppose we'd be safe from daleks no matter how incompetent the builders were.) It seemed so nice when we signed the lease last month. And even when we moved in, earlier this month. But now winter is coming INSIDE. The newly-installed windows don't close, in part because the window frames are set into the wall with mind-boggling ineptitude.
It's so very frustrating. We never thought about the doorposts of the house (except in thinking about mezuzot, obviously), and now it turns out Sovay can pry some of them loose with her fingers. That's just wrong.
I believe the landlord had the whole apartment gutted after damage from the previous tenants, and rebuilt with a somewhat different floor plan. That's why I have such a big bedroom with a walk-in closet and six windows. And why the kitchen was completely refurbished. We walked through in February while they were laying the new floor, and thought all the renovations would have that level of craftsmanship. The windows don't even meet code! (I called the landlord when I noticed. The installer had told him about the problem with a couple of the windows, and he had planned to replace them in a few weeks. That was when I asked the city how they dealt with building code violations--they're sending an inspector sometime this week.) I'm torn between wanting to keep a good relationship with the landlord and wanting to push him as hard as necessary to make him repair this [obscenity] properly and fast.
Getting the repairs done properly is a big deal. One thing I'm afraid of is that the landlord will say he'll make the repairs, and then just wrap some absurd amount of weatherstripping around the windows, so it looks kind of marginally ok until the next bad storm. I don't know if the landlord was taken advantage of by a wildly incompetent window-installer or an incompetent/dishonest building-inspector. (Do these things even get inspected?) Or if the landlord knew perfectly well what was going on, and did it that way on purpose.
I don't want to move again. I want to live in the apartment I thought we had found, if it can be made to exist. Meanwhile, I'm cold and scared.
At least we don't have raccoons. Or squirrels. Or daleks. (We're on the second floor. I suppose we'd be safe from daleks no matter how incompetent the builders were.) It seemed so nice when we signed the lease last month. And even when we moved in, earlier this month. But now winter is coming INSIDE. The newly-installed windows don't close, in part because the window frames are set into the wall with mind-boggling ineptitude.
It's so very frustrating. We never thought about the doorposts of the house (except in thinking about mezuzot, obviously), and now it turns out Sovay can pry some of them loose with her fingers. That's just wrong.
I believe the landlord had the whole apartment gutted after damage from the previous tenants, and rebuilt with a somewhat different floor plan. That's why I have such a big bedroom with a walk-in closet and six windows. And why the kitchen was completely refurbished. We walked through in February while they were laying the new floor, and thought all the renovations would have that level of craftsmanship. The windows don't even meet code! (I called the landlord when I noticed. The installer had told him about the problem with a couple of the windows, and he had planned to replace them in a few weeks. That was when I asked the city how they dealt with building code violations--they're sending an inspector sometime this week.) I'm torn between wanting to keep a good relationship with the landlord and wanting to push him as hard as necessary to make him repair this [obscenity] properly and fast.
Getting the repairs done properly is a big deal. One thing I'm afraid of is that the landlord will say he'll make the repairs, and then just wrap some absurd amount of weatherstripping around the windows, so it looks kind of marginally ok until the next bad storm. I don't know if the landlord was taken advantage of by a wildly incompetent window-installer or an incompetent/dishonest building-inspector. (Do these things even get inspected?) Or if the landlord knew perfectly well what was going on, and did it that way on purpose.
I don't want to move again. I want to live in the apartment I thought we had found, if it can be made to exist. Meanwhile, I'm cold and scared.
