we have a bed bug infestation. The first incident was in August. Our landlord did indeed send an exterminator but he only came once and said unless we see them again we shouldn’t call them. Obviously one treatment is never enough. Now over a couple weeks ago we have a severe infestation and the entire block has been having mattresses out on the street etc. PLUS the exterminator came in the meantime again and claimed he would come for the next couple of Saturdays, however, when we called him to confirm the appointment he said he probably wont make because he also has other clients and he might make it again in a month or so. I mean, we can SEE the bugs. We obviously have them. When we notified our landlord he said he would arrange for another exterminator,however, this has been going on way too long and our lease is only another 3 months and we already lost way too much money on needing to throw away furniture, etc. I am thinking to just stop paying rent? We asked if we can be released early from our rental contract but we are not receiving a response about this. Is just moving out and stop paying rent the best at this point? I am not sleeping there anymore with my dog because he was vomiting (presumably from the chemicals). Also, my nanny roommate got fired from her job because she brought bed bugs to work and couldn’t provide the mother with the name of the chemicals because the exterminator would not tell us until weeks later after complaining to the landlord about it.

You should call 311 to make a formal complaint against an unresponding landlord with HPD. HPD will send an inspector and can issue violations and order the landlord to consider the adjacent apartments.

As for how best to deal with an unresponding landlord aside from calling HPD: always politely and always in writing (follow up in writing any conversations on the phone or in person). Building this paper trail is important.

Good luck.

So our apartment had bed bugs in April, and we informed our building’s management. They sent in the exterminator that the building has on retainer, and he did not seem at all competent in handling the problem. I spoke with two different exterminators before the actual extermination process, and they both told me that I would need to do a ton of prep work in advance, including laundering everything I own, and then they said that the actual extermination process would take between 4-6 hours to do a thorough job in a three bedroom apartment. The exterminator my building uses told me to “wash my sheets” and then he proceeded to spray some chemicals around the house for an hour.

The bugs had seemed to be gone though, as we had a small problem and caught it early. But then, two weeks ago, one of the neighbors informed me that every tenant on our floor has bed bugs, as well as the tenants in the apartments above and below us. The building management never alerted us to this issue. We called the building management, who said that they would be exterminating all the apartments again. They had planned to do this last week, and never did. The contact person for the building management has been rude to our neighbors regarding their inquiries, and does not even respond to my phone calls. And now my apartment has the bed bugs too.

I would like to break my lease and move out. But first, I want the building to hire a competent exterminator to deal with this issue, so that I can feel comfortable taking the few belongings that I want to keep to my new home. How should i deal with my building management regarding my requests when they won’t respond to me? Thank you for your input!

And you can contact a housing hotline at MetCouncil: http://www.metcouncil.net/contact.htm

You should try to speak with knowledgeable people who can help you fight your eviction. You can contact your council member for help in finding help (from the street you mentioned your council member could be this one — if not you can go to the home page of the council site and enter your address to find the right one).

thanks,

John