Has your rent gone up? Do I expect too much??

If so, what kind of increases are they going up by?
We got a letter saying our rent is going up by $25 a week :o Now I have no problem paying this IF the landlord did ANY kind of maintenance on the house. The last thing she did was get the floors redone in June last year and she increases the rent then - again, we had no problem with the increase. But since then she has done NOTHING!!!! :wall:
Our oven needs seals and the light fixed, the gate needs fixing as it doesn't close properly, we have a couple of broken tiles around, the fence is leaning REALLY badly and the drain on the side of our house floods everytime we get large amounts of rain.

I'm happy to live with these things if she didn't increase the rent, but if she wants to increase it by $25 a week (which to me seems to be way more than inflation) then shouldn't she need to be doing maintenance around the house??? :dunno:

Ours went up by $5 a week, after being in the house for a year. I think it is more than reasonable. The house is great, the real estate and owners are fantastic, anything that needs doing gets done quickly.

BUT we lived in a ****box a few years ago, nothing was ever done to it EVER. The roof leaked, caused mold, on the ceiling in multiple rooms and apparently this was OUR fault even though we reported the leaks as soon as we noticed they were there. And they wanted us to not only clean the ceiling and repaint if necessary, BUT the increasde the rent by $20 a week. Not happening, we moved out quick smart. To re-rent it out they ended up replacing the roof, the ceilings, the carpet, retile the kitchen and bathroom, repainted the whole interior, and upgraded the electrics and the stove/oven.

At our old house, our rent was going to go up by $20/week once our lease ran out. We really didn't think it was worth it so we moved instead! Lol. Now we are living in a house almost twice the size for the same price (before it went up), although we moved to a town an hour away!

What are the property values like where you live? Our landlord hadn't really done much to the property to justify the increase in rent, but I think it would also depend on surrounding property values, the fees the real estate charge for property management and interest rates (particularly if they are still paying off a mortgage on the property). I know it sucks :hug:

Make sure they have given you the correct notice period..I didn't think they could increase rent until your lease ran out? Or they would have to give you a fairly significant notice period if you are still in a lease agreement.

our rent hasnt gone up YET, we havent been in here a year yet, will have in september, theres been a bit done to our house and more the next 2 weeks but DH is doing all the work so i want a rent decrease lol (our landlord is his mum which is why hes doing the work!)

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At our old house, our rent was going to go up by $20/week once our lease ran out. We really didn't think it was worth it so we moved instead! Lol. Now we are living in a house almost twice the size for the same price (before it went up), although we moved to a town an hour away!

What are the property values like where you live? Our landlord hadn't really done much to the property to justify the increase in rent, but I think it would also depend on surrounding property values, the fees the real estate charge for property management and interest rates (particularly if they are still paying off a mortgage on the property). I know it sucks :hug:

Make sure they have given you the correct notice period..I didn't think they could increase rent until your lease ran out? Or they would have to give you a fairly significant notice period if you are still in a lease agreement.

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Next door have the same house as us (just in the reverse) and are paying $370 a week - and they have a dishwasher!!!!! Our rent will go up to $385 a week and we don't have a dishwasher :( (would be nice though) and the neighbours on the other side are paying $360 a week.
They have given us 60 days notice we aren't signed onto a lease anymore...just week by week.

Ours is going up $10 a week next month. It was the same last year. I think it's fair enough.. I think it's still a really good price for the area.. there is nothing to rent around here, and things get snapped up really quickly (we actually go this property by offering more rent in the first place ;) )

I think I would have something to say about it if they asked for $25 a week more tho. Trouble is it would be really really hard to find anywhere else in this area, so we'd probably be stuck paying it. I'd be asking to see what similar properties they are referring to if they're saying they're bringing it into line with current market values.

A few years ago at the end of our lease they told us they were raising the rent from 250 to 285/wk (lower than market value apparently because we'd been good tenants) when we moved out we saw it advertised for 310/wk so a $60 rise!!

:hug: the rental market in this area of Sydney sucks! I am sick of it but we are stuck.

They put our rent up about a week after I came hoem with DD by $30 that was after it was put up by $10 only 6 mths before hand.

The owner cried poor about the shockking interest rate risers however failed to decrease the rent when they hit rock bottom.

I have an oven that doesnt work properly. A massive 1m squared hole in the wall that took ONE YEAR to fix, toilet leaking, kitchen taps that need fixing, under the sink needin fixing, guttering that is crap, and a front screen door that he supposedly fixed but you cant lock it from the outside because of the bodgy lock he put on it.

If he puts the rent up again we wont be able to stay. Its just not fair that they can get away with it. We rent privately through them which sucks as I cant go to a real estate if there is a problem and he sometimes comes onto our property without calling to look or measure something to fix which he never ends up fixing.

What do you do though? There is such a shortage in the area of properties to rent. :(

Sorry for the long post. I feel your pain :hug:

I would be looking around for something else, if it were me.

Yep - ours was supposed to go up to $290 a week (from $275) 6 months after we moved in. We've been here 17 months now, and our increase is finally coming in May. We figured they'd held off because we are awesome tennants, and then when we demanded the hot water unit be replaced, they upped the rent. Fair enough. But they also put us on a 12 month fixed-rent lease, after which we are planning to leave anyway (buy in the area or move back to Melbs) so we are going to hit them up to fix EVERYTHING in this place. :D It's with a very efficient RE agent, so it'll get done, too.

The place before this we skipped out of the second the lease was up. But I think they were pushing for an increase there too.

The place before that, the landlords changed management, who decided to put the rent up from $240 a week to $330. This increase came quite conveniently at a time that DH got a job in Brisbane.

One place I lived in ages ago they proposed to up the rent, but said that if we were willing to sign another 12 month lease, we could keep it. Maybe try that approach?

Check with your rental board - I think there's a percentage annual rise that is considered acceptable. Some landlords do it knowing that long-term tennants are unlikely to want to move, so will just accept it, rather than pay.

We've been living in our rental for 4 years this year and the first 3 years our rent went up by $10 a year, this years it's going up by $25...

Maintenance only gets done if it's REALLY important... however compared to what we'd be paying if we moved somewhere else it's still at least $50 cheaper per week.

At our old place (the one we got kicked out of) the rent was raised $75pw once we moved out (to $325 per week). The house was a crapbox, there was so much work needed doing, so much maintenance never done. We got kicked out for not getting repairs done but there is no way we would have stayed. The only justification is that in said little town people commute to said capital city one hour away because rental in ACT is too high so in our region it was ok because Canberrans could afford the rent. ITMS.

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I'm happy to live with these things if she didn't increase the rent, but if she wants to increase it by $25 a week (which to me seems to be way more than inflation) then shouldn't she need to be doing maintenance around the house??? :dunno:

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DP's parents kept getting their rent increased and wouldn't get anything maintained by the landlord. Whenever anything went wrong it was always DP's parent's fault :rolleyes:

So apparently the fence that was rotten at the base fell because DP's parents caused the freakish storm which took out the (rusted out) garage guttering and it landed on the already bent and virtually unusable clothesline...... DP's parents reported the fence on several occasions......

Anyway, long story short. After several abusive visits by the landlady DP's parents rang the rental advisory place to complain about the awful conditions and lack of maintenance. They sent an inspector out and the house is going to be deemed unliveable :lol:

If you think the rent is unfair maybe contact the rental board thingo.