We have two rather large/tall lilac bushes next to the brick wall in front of our patio. Last year, when they blossomed, the lilac smell was very heavy. So heavy, we couldn't go out on our patio or open our patio door for fresh air. It was truly terrible. Plus, my wife has asthma problems and takes an OTC for it. So, we decided, without thinking about asking manager, to snip-cut all of the blossoms off of each bush. Well, an old neighbor didn't like that and reported to the manager that we had destroyed complex property. How they knew it was us, I have no idea, but. Anyway, the manager called us, ask if we had cut them, and we told her "yes" we had and why. She told us we couldn't just automatically cut them off, to call her the next Spring so she can do something, like relocate the bushes. Well, when we signed our new 1-yr. Lease, the bottom of it stated: Problems To Fix: So, we put down the lilac bushes to be relocated in the Spring and why we desire that. When I paid the rent last month, I asked the manager if she had remembered that we had put on the new Lease about the lilac bushes. She told me that there was nothing she could do about them. That didn't go over to well with wife or I, but we let it go. The maintenance person told us to send an e-mail to the manager when the blossoms started coming out and explain (again) why the bushes need to be relocated. Use the e-mail as correspondence evidence, if the manager does nothing. Contact the corporate office and explain to them about the health hazard the bushes present to us. But, in doing that, we will definitely be put on the manager's "sh*t list" and we sure don't want an eviction notice. Any ideas???
Allergies due to bushes, flowers, grasses, etc., don't constitute a health hazard speaking legally. If maintenance was spraying chemicals causing allergies, that could be considered a health hazard and release you from your lease agreement. If it is affecting your health, I would suggest moving and paying off whatever you could negotiate with management.
I do not know how someone can arbitrate an amendment to a new lease without it being properly represented by the corporate office to begin with. By properly represented I do not mean management but the originator of the lease. In all actuality Cody, you could get cited for the destruction of real property if the corporate office didn’t approve the amendment. You live in an apartment community, not in a free standing house. You rent an apartment and a place to park. That’s it. You don’t rent the whole property. One of the reasons people plant lilacs to begin with isn’t just for their looks. The plant w/ the bloom is one of the strongest pest control plants there is so by removing those blossoms you’ve helped to increase the population of ticks, mosquitos and other unwanted disease carrying bugs. The more ticks and bugs then the more the exterminator has to spray poisons to get rid of them. Which…..begs the question of what you did with those blossoms when you cut them off. Did you throw them away or just let them lay around after you whacked them up? Dunno. If I was the manager I might have offered you the option of moving to another apartment, breaking the lease or just flat told you to put on your mask if you don’t like the fragrance of the flowers. I wouldn’t go to the expense of having my lawn maintenance people uprooting and moving the plants over the wants of a single tenant. In essence, the flowers were there first ergo you moved into their territory, they didn’t move into yours.
Well, I see we get absolutely no sympathy here. Actually, that's sort of terrible! Why? Yes, lilac odor smells good, but when the odor is so heavy that we can't go out on our patio to grill or even open up our patio door to get fresh outside air in, then what? Please remember, folks, the neighbor who complained that WE cut the blossoms off, actually didn't know/see we did it. We just thank God they moved. Even the manager, in her office, told me she seen something wrong with them. She wouldn't say what that "something" was, but she did tell me that. Both bushes are right in front of our patio, and, walking around the building, nobody else, on the bottom floor, has these bushes right in front of their apartment! Maintenance told me, while working on something inside our apartment, that the bushes ARE a health hazard if they disturb my wife who has some asthma problems. Don't know why the lilac odor wasn't heavy in 2020, but it wasn't. Only last year, so far. Management is suppose to take care of certain problems residents have, especially if they can't enjoy their patio area during summer months. I guess, since none of you are in the same predicament that we are in, it may be hard to understand. Anyway, perhaps the odor won't be so heavy this Spring..........HOPEFULLY!!
And, Bobby, talking about destruction of private property? Local P.D. would have files full of reports, given them by managers, of how former residents left an apartment when they moved. The last complex we lived in, the manager told me "you wouldn't believe some of the cleaning-up we have to do and then try to get the money from a former resident, when the deposit didn't cover all of the cleanup."
You obviously didn’t understand what I wrote. You DO NOT rent the property that the complex is sitting on. In your agreement with the owner, you pledged not to trash the property that the complex is sitting on which you did. Much the same as someone leaving litter or garbage on the sidewalk, you ignored a tenet of your lease. The conversation isn’t about what someone else does in their apartment or did in another apartment but what you did to the property you do not rent nor have possession of. Taking it upon yourself to do ANYTHING to the property without permission from the corporate office can be an infraction of your lease. I’m sorry your wife is having difficulties but truthfully, I really believe you might wish to harness that Karen you’re toting around cause it’s going to eventually get you into trouble.
It isn't that people here have no sympathy, they are just seeing all sides of the issue. For my entire adult life until I was 55 I had bad spring allergies to just about everything. I had a neighbor that had old straggly raggedy lilac bushes, and flea ridden ornamental evergreens that set off my allergies to extremes. I offered to even pay to remove those offending bushes but he refused and said they were therapeutic for him and helped his arthritis. There was nothing I could do but suffer and take meds and allergy shots, none of which helped. When he sold the buyers wanted the raggedy unkempt flea-filled half-dead bushes removed at his expense, so he came over and asked if my offer was still good. My big NO wasn't very nice. I overcame my allergies after I went on antiviral and heavy-dose vitamin therapy. Allergies are about a compromised immune system. Perhaps a visit to an immunologist might be a good idea. Anywhere you move in "cowboy" country is going to boast spring allergies which can increase as one ages and the immune system weakens. I would advise looking for a new place in the spring so you can experience what spring is like at that location before you sign a binding agreement. The western cowboy lifestyle comes at a cost.
Ok, how about if I try (do) this now...........what Sgt. Shultz says in Hogan's Heros "I hear nothing, I see nothing" (when it comes to this thread), that, evidently, I should've never/ever done. Funny, but we get full sympathy from our family, with no problem. Guess they know us better than any of you do. Just a fact. They also completely understand the thread I done about marijuana, our feelings about it and how it sort of taken over the state of Colorado. Guess I need to discuss more things with family, that know us, than on this forum, where, to a point, nobody knows us and our feelings. And, absolutely nothing against Ken's forum, at all. Just wanted to make that clear.
Cody, we just have to accept that everything in life isn't going to suit us. I do understand about strong-smelling blooms, though. We walked through Lowe's the week before Easter and the smell of the Easter lillies in there was nauseating. I felt bad for the cashiers who had to work next to that all day.