Is this considered an illegal apartment rental? ?

Question

I was told by my electric utility company as well as the city that I reside, that they needed a permit from my apartment leasing office and until then no electricity can be provided to my unit. I even spoke to several city officials who confirmed that my apartment (which is newly built) had not provided the city with a permit. I told my leasing agent about this as well as management and they lied that a permit was given because they’re receiving electricity. My unit received electricity but it was not from my utility company. The city and my utility company confirmed that no electricity could be sent to my unit since the city didn’t get a permit from the apartment. The question is how in the world was I receiving electricity? Unless the apartment were doing foul play and supplying my unit with their own electricity. Considering I never received any electricity bill.

I spoke to another official who concluded that perhaps the apartment provided the city with the wrong meter number of my specific unit because the meter number that they provided to the city is for a Completely different address. After speaking to my apt manager about this a million times they ignored me and refused to call the city. I ended up breaking my lease due to unprofessional management who treated me like I was not a priority. They tried to bill me $13k but dropped the bill after I brought up the permit situation. I asked what was the reason for them dropping the bill and they refused to respond.

Coffee Drinker · Answer

Sounds like they connected to another building or something and never got the required electrical permits.

If you were paying for electricity then they probably just picked another meter number so they'd have something to base the charges on, so what you paid wasn't actually your portion of electric it was someone elses.

If I were you, I'd just move on and forget about it. You paid rent & utilities and you got a place to live with utilities, so you weren't really screwed out of anything even if the utility bills weren't completely accurate.

They are dropping any charges for the lease termination, so just leave that problem behind and forget about it.

A Hunch · Answer

Your entire question makes not sense.
The city GIVES permits not "gets them from your apartment leasing office".If it's newly built, it's called a Certificate of Occupancy.Your apartment complex doesn't provide the city with a meter number.  The electric company INSTALLS THE METER (not the building contractor).  If the meter on file doesn't match their records, it sounds like the electric company made an error.They tried to bill you $13000.  Unless the statute of limitation for a lawsuit has run out in your area, you can't be sure that the issue isn't going to pop up again.

Slumlord · Answer

They were probably doing something borderline, like pretending the electricity was for somewhere else (hence the wrong meter number), or whatever.  Anyhow, you are out of it, its not your problem any more.  Forget it, move on.

Slickterp · Answer

They wired your unit off something else obviously.

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Is this considered an illegal apartment rental? ?

4 Answers