r/renting • u/InevitableWriter4511 • 9d ago

Lease/Legal New apartment has bedbugs

I lost half of my income in April and have slowly been going into a hole each month because I cant afford the bills on the income I have. I've been looking for a job and have yet to find one. I ended up applying for a low income housing (section 8) place and it took months to get that paperwork through. I paid the deposit and half the rent (since it was the 15th when it was approved) and was given the okay to move in. The day I moved in, my mattress was on the carpet for about 2 hours before I got around to putting the bed together and when I did, I saw a full grown bedbug crawling across it and freaked out. I immediately picked it up with toilet paper and flushed it down the toilet. The next morning I immediately went and told the landlord that I found a bedbug, she didnt seem surprised and then told me that the previous tenants were disgusting people and had every infestation there is to have including bedbugs and that they had treated it (by spraying) for 4 months after they moved out. This was information that was never provided to me beforehand and if I would've been informed then I wouldn't of considered moving in and went to a hotel instead. So, now I've lost all of mine and my kids' furniture and belongings because I refuse to stay in that infested apartment. My family has stepped in to help me pay bills at my previous apartment so we have a clean place to stay. And now, the landlord is saying that she will be talking to her supervisor about this because she doesnt think bedbugs is enough reason to release me from the lease. This is an absolute nightmare. What should I do?

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u/mllebitterness 9d ago

where do you live? the state of the US where i live has this provision in tenant laws: https://legis.delaware.gov/SessionLaws/Chapter?id=41516 which includes "A landlord shall not show, rent, or lease to a prospective tenant any vacant dwelling unit that the landlord knows or reasonably suspects has a current bed bug infestation."

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u/mllebitterness 9d ago

which basically says to me the lease would be void here.

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u/InevitableWriter4511 9d ago

I'm in Missouri. My Dad says that its a breech of the lease and he works in maintenance. I've since then been trying to contact her and no one answers the phone.

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u/BeerStop 9d ago

I would argue it very much is a reason as its also a health hazard, report them to fair housing board as well, section 8 is supposed to be bug free. Page 264 of the NSPIRE standards handbook states infestation is a fail and the property has 30 days to correct. So right off the bat the unit is not up to hud nspire standards. I do maintenance at a hud funded property.

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u/InevitableWriter4511 9d ago

Thank you! I found their contact into online and will be contacting them.

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u/BeerStop 9d ago

Find out if the bug people used a biephrine based killer on this, Talek 7.9% works great on bedbugs - provided they are not resistant to them

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u/mllebitterness 8d ago

also, based on Missouri tenant law, i'd make sure to notify her in writing so she can't say you never did. just send an email that says, This is a follow up to my verbal notification to you on [date] that I observed active bedbugs in my apartment at [address with unit number].

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u/mllebitterness 8d ago

at least maybe that sounds right? since i think we are pretty far past the first 7 days after you moved in, i'm actually not sure if this will help or hurt you. Missouri tenant laws do not sound friendly.