Potential letter to landlord

So, I'm currently living with Julie in Boston. I think everyone who reads this know that. Our rent is $950. The landlord sent us a letter saying she wants to raise the rent $300 for me being here. Here is the response I prepared. Comments are welcome.

Dear Debbie,

I received your letter dated April 4, 2007. I double checked my email and it does appear that I sent it to the proper address, deb851@aol.com, on March 3, 2007. Perhaps it got stuck in your spam box as you suggested.

Regarding the change in rent due to my brother Eric moving in, I feel that the increase you are proposing may be a bit excessive. You suggest that the additional resources he will use would cost you $300 per month. You list those resources as follows:

• Electricity
• Water
• Air conditioning
• Wear and tear on apartment
• Wear and tear on laundry machines

While these are certainly valid concerns, you will be glad to know that some are unfounded, and others are, fortunately, much less expensive than you may think.

Electricity: Eric being in the apartment will undoubtedly lead to change in electricity usage. However, we do not expect our electricity usage to increase much at all. The only new electrical uses will be for his laptop (60 watts, 4 hours a day) and a bedside lamp (60 watts, 10 minutes a day). There are some changes to our current electric usage as well: the lights in our bathroom will be on more (240 watts, 30 minutes a day), the TV will be used more (80 watts, 2 hours a day), the microwave (1500 watts, 5 minutes a day), and the washer and dryer will be used an additional 4 hours a month. There is a great tool for deducing the cost of one’s electricity at http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/howmuch.html. Using this site, we determined that Eric’s electrical use is about $6.80 per month.

Water: We went through all of the various things one uses water for during the course of a month in order to determine the cost of additional water. Fortunately, the federal government has a Web site that helps you with this, http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/sq3.html
It turns out that in the course of a day, Eric uses about 32 gallons of water. This includes a ten minute shower, three flushes of the toilet, two hand-washings, two tooth-brushings, and a 3-4 glasses of drinking water. This comes out to 960 gallons per month. Additionally, he runs two loads of laundry a month, another 10 gallons each time. We run our dishwasher 3-4 times per month – each load uses 20 gallons. So the total for all this water use is about 1,050 gallons.=

According to http://www.mwraadvisoryboard.com/2006%20Survey%20Master%20Document.pdf (the MWRA is the agency that charges for water & sewage) water & sewage combined cost $0.095 per gallon. This translates into $10.05 per month in additional water & sewage usage due to Eric’s residency.

Air conditioning: We will not be adding another air conditioning unit. The hours that we have the air conditioners running will not change, nor will the temperature at which they are set.

Additionally, you have stated (and we have agreed to pay) that you wish to charge us an additional $25 per month for air conditioning this summer.

Wear and tear on apartment: We feel that this is covered by our security deposit, which provides for funds in case we leave the apartment in a state of disrepair. In addition, Eric does not engage in any activities that would alter the state of the apartment. What little time he spends in the apartment is mainly spent on our furniture – couches, beds, chairs, etc. He certainly would not be altering or diminishing the state of the apartment in any way.
Wear and tear on laundry machines: Typically, one can expect a washer and dryer to last 10 years. We tried to find the prices of your models online, but failed. But let’s assume that they cost $1000 total. This comes out to $8.33 per month in cost. Split between the three apartments in this residence, this comes out to $2.78 per unit, of which Eric would be responsible for a third of our portion, or $0.93 per month. In addition, we already pay for the machines – in fact, Eric will be paying $4 per month in quarters.

So, if we add this all up, we get the following:

• Electrical: $6.80
• Water: $10.05
• A/C: $0.00
• Wear to apartment: $0.00
• Wear to laundry: $0.93
• Total: $17.78

Looking at these numbers, we think you will agree that your proposed rent increase of $300 is far out of line with the actual cost of Eric’s arrival, and we hope you will consider allowing us to continue to be tenants by modifying your request. Since it is possible we are underestimating Eric’s resource usage, we would like to err on the side of caution and assume he will use almost three times as many resources as we estimate - $50 a month – thus, we hope you will agree to raise our rent to $1000.

On another note, we have been having some problems around the apartment that we are hoping you can help us out with. Specifically:

• The light outside our back door does not work. The bulb is not the problem.
• We cannot make a copy of the key to the front door. We have tried making four keys at three different locations, and all four do not work.
• The bolt lock on the front door does not work.
• The heat vent in the closet in the bedroom facing the street does not work.
• The light in the closet in the bedroom facing the street does not work – the string/cord broke.

Please get back to us at your convenience about these issues.

Thank you,

Shawn, Julie, and Eric Engel