[lilith02100]

My dad has lived in his apartment building for over 2 years his land lord refuses to fix anything his fawcett drips and his tolite keeps running all day if you don't jiggle the handle. 6 months ago new tentants moved in and he has had bed bugs there ever since. He told his land lord about this problem and he refuses to do anything about it. His land lord blamed him for the bugs. Which is impossible because all my dad does is go to work then go home and watch TV and sleep. He never travels or stays anywhere else. My dad has bought all kinds of things to try to kill these bedbugs, even a rug scrubber, but every time he thinks they are gone a few days later he finds them again. They keep coming in from other apartments. I have seen a least 6 couches out in the trash so I know a bunch of the apartments are infected. Plus my dad talked to some of the other people that live there and they said that they had them also. My dad told his land lord that he is not paying rent until he does something about the bugs but still nothing. So now my dad owes 2 months rent. And he is thinking of moving out because he can not stand getting bit up any more. He is a nervouse reck he constantly thinks things are crawling on him and biting him. Anyway what can he do about this? Can he take his land lord to court? And if he moves out and the land lord wants his money what should he do? Also should he call the health department?

[twinkiedooter]

He can call the Health Department but I doubt if they can "force" his landlord to get rid of the bed bugs. They are very hard to totally eliminate especially if the entire building is infested with them.

Dad will get evicted if he does not pay the rent.

If he wants to move elsewhere, he needs to take every stitch of his clothing and wash in hot water. Every towel, bedlinen in hot water. If he has a couch that is fabric, ditch it. The only furniture he should take to his new apartment would be all wooden furniture that is thoroughly wiped down to kill any lingering bedbugs.

Bedbugs could have been brought in by the new neighbors. All they needed to do is visit a hotel or motel and these critters jumped into their luggage.

If he does not want to move, he needs to coordinate his bedbug killing with all the other tenants or they will just keep jumping from one dirty apartment into a freshly cleaned apt.

They are very hard to get rid of. My sympathies to your father.

As far as fixing the toilet so it does not keep running - has he opened the lid up and diagnosed the problem or just keeps jiggling the handle. Most toilet problems are easy to fix himself. The float could be too high or the flapper at the bottom needs replaced. $4 part.

[CrabbyApple]

I have a similar situation. My father is a very difficult person to deal with. Because of that - I decided to walk away from the 2 family house and to buy my own single family house. My father was left there with an empty apartment and forced to rent it. After warning him not to post it on Craigslist and to be more picky with his incoming tenants - he, of course rented it to the first person willing to give him rent money. This action he learned was the wrong one.

The tenant paid one month of rent and then stopped. In the meantime, he taunted my father and did all kinds of things to wreck the place. I helped pay for the eviction and moving costs to get this tenant out of his house. Last week, the movers discovered bed bugs in the tenants furniture. I will not go over to my father's house or let him come to my new house until his house has been inspected by an exterminator. I also feel my father cannot handle being a landlord and want him to walk away from the house and get an apartment. I am at my wit's end with this man and don't know what to do.