Bait & Switch

By Joe Wiley

We are moving to a rental townhouse in Mt. Laurel, NJ.  The owner is a single guy in his 50’s moving to a larger home a development over, hired his HS buddy to try to sell his house or rent it out.  We were accepted as renters, signed the lease, and have handed over the security deposit (month and a half).  We are to hand first months rent to the realtor on Friday to get the keys.  But he left the key under the door mat so we could move boxes in last night.  The house still had personal items to the owner in the garage and through out the house so we decided not to leave any of our stuff there.  There was a water issue under the sink that still hasn’t been addressed that we said we wanted the water leak fixed and the damaged soaked and disgusting wood underneath replaced because of fear of mold.  We’re a couple in our early 30’s with 3 & 1 year old boys. The master bathroom vent worked when we viewed the house 2 wks ago, last night it was dead.  Our biggest complaint is the house was shown to us with a nice side by side refrigerator in the kitchen with water and ice hook up, there was a dinky small disgusting fridge in the garage.  Last night the side by side was gone and the small garage fridge had been moved to the kitchen.  We were never told this would happen and all along we’ve felt like the realtor has been favoring the owner in this dual agent situation.  Can I please get advice for how to address the issues we are not happy about?  Do we have grounds for backing out now, since we’re feeling so horribly about the people we’re dealing with and the situation they’re putting us in?  Can I argue to have the fridge back?  Or do I approach it from trying to renegotiate the rent down?  The lease mentions nothing about appliances at all.  Please help!

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Holy Cow, we couldn't find any other related post. Sorry. :(