Attorney Henrietta Feldman has been practicing real estate law for nearly 20 years. Originally licensed in Massachusetts, she has maintained her own law office in Florida since 2015. Henrietta Feldman’s responsibilities include negotiating sale agreements and loan agreements, and handling other real estate issues.
One of the issues that some tenants may face is harassment from a landlord. When a person rents property, they have a right to peaceful enjoyment of their rental unit. When landlords disrupt this enjoyment and attempt to intimidate or pressure a tenant into leaving their rental unit, they are committing harassment.
Landlords may do this to force a rent-controlled tenant to move or respond to tenant complaints, or because they don’t agree with the tenant belonging to a particular gender, religion, or other group of people. Regardless of the reason, harassment from a landlord is illegal.
A variety of behaviors constitute landlord harassment. These include entering a unit without giving the tenant proper notice or refusing to perform maintenance on the unit. Utilities may also be shut off to the tenant’s unit, or tenants may suddenly be cut off from certain amenities. More extreme examples of harassment include removing a tenant’s possessions, changing the locks on common area doors or unit doors, and raising rent without notice.
Even if a tenant encounters a behavior that is an example of landlord harassment, it is not considered harassment unless the behavior continues. Isolate incidents do not constitute landlord harassment.
