Keeping the peace with your landlord

After spending their freshman year living in dorms, many Penn students opt for the more independent life of an off-campus apartment. But as they begin their hunt, many are unprepared to deal with landlords.

A student's off-campus experience can be greatly affected by their relationship with their landlord. And knowing the protocol for interactions between tenants and landlords can make all the difference.

Developing a good relationship with a landlord "begins from the housing search process," Director of Off-Campus Living Miki Farcas said. That search should usually start in November the year before students want to move off-campus.

Forced to think so far ahead, some students go into the search process unprepared, causing tension between landlords and student renters, Farcas said.

Some students try to find an apartment without a complete group of roommates, making lease-signing difficult. Farcas said students should start apartment hunting with people committed to living together.

Although tenants are protected by law, "Pennsylvania is more of a landlord state rather than a tenant state," Farcas said.

She added that the most important piece of advice she could give was to keep track of disagreements with landlords.

"Document, document, document," she said. "Unless you have created documentation for a problem, the problem does not exist."

Written records of disputes can aid in legal negotiations.

Another important problem is that "people do not read the lease," Farcas said. "You may not be able to change it ... but at least you [should] know what you are signing."

She emphasized that students should be aware of their rights before signing a lease. Knowing what is legal makes negotiations with a landlord much easier, Farcas said.

For example, some leases say that landlords can enter the premises without prior notification. If tenants submit written requests against this, "the right to privacy should supercede the lease," Farcas said, meaning that landlords legally cannot enter without notice.

When requesting repairs, students should not seem angry, but be very specific about the problem, Farcas advised.

For students living off campus, dealing with landlords is all about striking the right balance.

After a bad experience living near campus this past summer, College sophomore Sonia Pascal decided to move downtown to the Ben Franklin apartment building.

She said that her landlord at her previous 40th and Sansom residence was difficult to get in touch with. Now, Pascal says, she has great communication with her landlords because "they are right in the building."

When things weren't getting fixed in her old residence, Pascal and her roommates "used to write nasty letters to the landlord. We called constantly, we e-mailed constantly," she said.

But for many repairs, "we had to learn to fix [them] ourselves."

Engineering and Wharton junior Danny Panzer -- who lives at 40th and Spruce streets -- advised students to "try to find other people who live underneath [the landlord] and see how they are and what their record is like" before signing the lease.

College junior Peter Fielding, who lives in Hamilton Court on the 3700 block of Chestnut Street, said that there was only one instance in which "we had a real pressing need and [building staff] didn't come quickly."

But in the end, he says, "I love living off campus. It's definitely worth the extra hassle."

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