“I have no hot water.”
While renting a home, your hot water heater goes on the fritz and you find yourself showering in icy cold water. You put a call into your landlord or property manager and fill them in and they start calling their plumbers in to sort you out. As luck would have it, the plumber doesn’t have the part he needs, but he can have it ready by tomorrow in order to complete the job.
“I want a hotel.”
As the tenant, you feel rather inconvenienced by this, so you ask your landlord to put you up in a hotel for the night, since you would like to have a hot shower before work, but the landlord refuses. Can they deny you hotel accommodations while the repairs are being made?
Fact is, the landlord has no responsibility or requirement to place you in a hotel while repairs are being made. Even if the repair could be viewed as materially affecting you health and safety, there is no requirement or language in the Texas Property Code or the residential lease contract approved by the Texas Association of Realtors.
If the landlord fails to make repairs that could jeopardize your physical health and safety, you may have options for remedies, which you can find with the Texas Property Code (as usual, this is where we have to note we are not lawyers and if you need legal advice, we suggest you reach out a professional lawyer to obtain it).
image courtesy of RJL20
