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Ally Greer

De-location, the new relocation?

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Wade Foster, CEO of the automation software company Zapier, announced last week that they will be offering $10,000 to any employees who want to leave the Bay Area and continue working for the company elsewhere.

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In his post, Foster explained the rationale behind this initiative, which seems to be the first of its kind:

Some of us fall in love with the area and are financially able to make this home. But for the rest of us, it can be a real challenge to turn the Bay Area into a life-long home rather than a short stop somewhere in our twenties and thirties. The housing crunch and high cost of living simply price out many families and, despite loving the area, the realities are many of us need to look elsewhere to create the life we want for our families.

Zapier seems to be addressing a problem that is increasingly facing young professionals in the Bay Area: the burning desire to work in the tech industry, but the economic inability to live where the majority of those jobs exist. Tech companies have taken a lot of the blame for the recent hikes in San Francisco and Silicon Valley rent prices, but the fact is turning out to be that their employees can barely afford to live here themselves. Last year, engineers at Facebook went directly to Mark Zuckerberg himself to ask if the company would subsidize some of their housing expenses due to their surprising inability to make ends meet. This sentiment has been shared by employees of many of the Bay Area’s major tech employers, including Twitter, Apple and more.

In 2015, our friends at Radpad and Anthology conducted a study to find out how much of their salaries Bay Area employees were spending on rent, and this is what they found:
Experts recommend spending about 30% of your income on rent.

These numbers are not only well over the recommended 30%, but they’re also based on salary data for mid-to-senior-level engineers who make well into the $100,000’s per year, according to the same study. For context, the average American household income in 2016 was around $50,000 and the average entry-to-mid-level salary in the Bay Area was between $70-90,000.

Being that Zapier’s employees are 100% remote and they don’t have an official HQ, this experiment makes perfect sense for them, and I have a feeling it will take off. With an increasing number of inhabitants leaving the Bay Area — not to mention California in general — and a decreasing number of new residents moving in, the time couldn’t be more perfect. Plus, not only are they offering this $10,000 in relocation assistance to current employees, but they’re also offering it to new hires who are looking for both a new opportunity and a more affordable place to live. For those with flexibility who have either been in San Francisco for 5 months or 5 years, a Bay Area job and a St. Louis or Austin rent check could actually be a pretty attractive offer.

You tell us: Would you de-locate for a new job? What would it take?

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You Tell Us: Rent or Buy?

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Today, the average age of renters continues to climb well into the mid-30s, leading to home ownership going down, even as rental prices go up.

There are quite a few reasons why renting seems to be be more attractive than buying to millennials:

  • Increased popularity of the “nomad” lifestyle or staying in a city for a short time before moving to a different one.
  • Larger amounts of pre-existing debt.
  • Focus on other investments that have a higher expected return.
  • According to Chris Copley of TD Bank, “Ten years ago, debt-to-income ratios were in the 50 range without issue, now it’s a hard stop at 43.” Getting a mortgage is harder now than it was in the early 2000’s and before.
  • Post-housing bubble, many of the single- and multi-family buildings that were purchased are now being rented to tenants. This has led to an increase in rental inventory, and can also be paired with an 11% decrease in (purchased) home inventory this year to explain an increase in renter households.

Spill it

To add to our never-ending journey to make apartment hunting suck less, we’re looking to learn why you continue to rent instead of buying a home at your current life stage. Send an email to ally@padmapper.com with your country, city, state, age, and a little bit about your current living situation and why you rent. We’ll be using the best ones in an upcoming post about renting vs. buying. Can’t wait to hear from you!

Can My Landlord Come Into My Apartment?

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As a renter, you’re entitled to a certain set of rights. Because it may not always be clear what exactly these rights are, we’re going to do our best to make sure you know as much information about as many of them as possible.

Although specific laws regarding a landlord’s right to enter an occupied apartment vary by state, they tend to be generally similar across the US and Canada.

Short answer: No.

There are many situations in which a landlord may need to enter an apartment, including but not limited to:

  • Dealing with an emergency
  • Making repairs
  • Conducting inspections
  • Taking health and safety measures
  • Showing the unit to prospective tenants
  • Addressing an issue during tenant’s extended absence
  • Investigating reasonable belief of a lease violation

In all of these instances, however, there are two important requirements that the landlord must meet in order to comply with the law, the first of which is giving proper notice. The amount of advance notice a landlord must provide to a tenant is typically 24 hours in both the US and Canada, but can actually be up to two days in states like Alabama, Hawaii, Arizona, Washington, or Vermont.

The second part of the landlord’s duty involves the time of entry. Most tenant law states that, once the landlord has given notice to the tenant, they must plan their visit during reasonable hours. This typically translates to sometime between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.

The (obvious) exception

Unsurprisingly, the most prominent exception to these regulations is a severe emergency situation. If there is a fire or a flood in your apartment, for example, your landlord has the right to enter without giving any notice at all. In this situation, though, it’s safe to say that landlord entry benefits all involved parties.

If you feel as though your landlord has violated one of these rules, first address it with him or her directly, and if the issue continues, you can file a suit or local court complaint. Make sure to check your state’s tenant laws before doing this!

Disclaimer: The information provided here is for informational purposes only. By using this free service, you agree to PadMapper’s terms and conditions. All PadBlogger content is provided on an “As Is” basis, without warranty, either expressed or implied, of any kind. While every effort is made to ensure that information contained within is correct, PadMapper does not guarantee the reliability or accuracy of any information provided and makes no representation or warranty about the content herein. Visitors should not substitute information on this website for personal legal advice. If you have a legal issue, you should seek legal counsel from an attorney in the state in which you reside.
Additional Resources:
U.S. Landlord – Tenant Law
Rights of Tenants: Landlord Entering Your Home
When can a landlord enter my apartment?
[CANADA] Can my landlord enter my home?
State Laws on Landlord’s Access to Rental Property

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Renters Rights: Breaking a Lease

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As a renter, you’re entitled to certain things that might not explicitly be stated in your lease. It may not always be clear what these rights are. We’re going to do our best to make sure you know about as many of them as possible.

There are many situations that can occur to cause you to find yourself wanting to break your lease, as well as a few different ways to do it. Breaking a lease could turn into a time-consuming and expensive process, though, so before considering whether or not you can, you might want to take a quick moment to consider if you should.

The easy way

If you’re lucky, you’ll be able to quickly get in touch with your landlord, explain your situation, and come to a simple agreement from which you both benefit. In this case, you’ll likely end up paying something like the remainder of your rent for the current period.

Pro tip: If you are able to help find a new tenant to take over the lease, this conversation is likelier to work out the way you want it to. You can even post your room or apartment on PadMapper and our sister site Zumper by using Post a Pad on our iOS or Android app to do this in an easy and efficient way.

The little-more-complicated-way

Giving notice

If a casual conversation with your landlord doesn’t do the trick, it’s time to turn to your lease. Typically, you’ll find something called a break clause that describes the processes and conditions required of either the tenant or the landlord to legally break the lease before it ends.

The first part of giving notice is the how. It’s possible for a break clause to dictate the form in which notice is given, such as a written letter sent to one or multiple specific addresses. If these regulations do exist, it’s important to follow them closely as a minor violation could result in your landlord not having to accept your notice.

The second step is the when. The two timing components of breaking a lease involve the date your lease began and the date you plan to leave. Normally, the lease will require something like 20-30 days required notice before leaving. A bit less commonly, a break clause can contain limitations on breaking your lease dependent on how long you’ve been there. For example, it’s possible for a tenant to only be able to break a yearlong lease after having lived there for 6 months.

Pro tip: After having served notice of intention to break the lease, ask your landlord for a written agreement to work with you on doing so.

Meeting conditions

Aside from form and timing of notice, the break clause of your lease should also contain the conditions that must be met in order for you to legally break the lease (or for the landlord to do so in the opposite situation). These can include being up-to-date on rent at the time of leaving and ensuring that the current rental period is paid for if you’re leaving before it ends, vacating the apartment entirely and completing all outstanding repairs, or ensuring that all current tenants will be breaking the lease and vacating the unit.

Now, let’s dig a bit more into these conditions. Being current on rent payments is pretty self-explanatory and shouldn’t present much of an issue. If your landlord does require you to pay out the rest of the rent period, it’s typically easiest to bite the bullet and clear this up as soon as you possibly can so that you can move on with a clean slate. If you’re strapped financially, you can try to build a payment plan that allows you to make up for the lost costs to your landlord over the next few months.

You may also see the word dilapidation in your break clause. This intimidating word simply refers to the repairs for which you are responsible at the end of your lease. Whether there was damage caused during your tenancy or the original unit was modified in the context of interior decoration, you are responsible for returning the unit to the condition in which you moved into it, which also usually happens to be the condition you’re required to leave it in. Make sure that you’re aware of all of the repairs you’re responsible for by checking the other sections of your lease.

Pro tip: It definitely wouldn’t hurt to ask your landlord if there are any outstanding damages that he or she is aware of that you’ll need to have settled before leaving.

Pro tip II: Just as you, the tenant, are required to meet certain conditions of the break clause, your landlord has a similar obligation. Once you’ve given notice, whether or not you end up involved in the process of finding a new tenant, your landlord is actually obligated to advertise the unit and actively try to refill it. If another tenant is found before the end of the lease period, then you’re no longer going to be responsible for paying the rent that you were previously accountable for. The landlord’s responsibility to mitigate damages includes making sure that they are doing everything they can to make this happen.

Other options

Sometimes, you can try to go through all of these actions, but for one reason or another, the stars don’t align and you’re unable to get out of your lease without a bigger hassle than you can handle.

The most common option for getting around breaking your lease is subletting. If subletting is allowed, this could be the easiest way to move out without having to shell out the rest of the rent. On your own, you can find a new tenant to occupy the unit and pay the rent. Notable about this route is that you will legally still be the tenant on the lease, and therefore responsible for the actions as well as financial obligations of the person who is currently living there.

While this isn’t technically an “other” option because it does involve some of the same steps involved in the break clause and was mentioned briefly before, you can also settle with your landlord. If he or she is willing to cooperate, you can have a conversation where you go through the outstanding repairs, payments, etc. and come to an agreement on which ones you will be responsible for and which ones can be waived. 

To wrap it up, here’s a list of things to be aware of thanks to the Tenant Resource Center in Wisconsin (the laws here are specific to Wisconsin but are similar to those in many states across the U.S.):

  • The landlord can charge you for the difference in price if they weren’t able to rent it at the original price. (For example, if you signed a lease for $800/mo, and they rerented the property for $700/mo for a year, then you could end up being asked to pay $1200, the difference in price.) If you think that’s unreasonable, you’ll need to show that the landlord could have rented it at the original price (“here, look at all these people willing to pay that amount”), and possibly argue that in Small Claims Court, if you and your landlord aren’t able to come to agreement.
  • Your landlord is allowed to charge advertising costs.
  • Your landlord is not allowed to charge for their time. 
  • If landlords don’t normally take many steps to rent out their properties, then that’s all they have to do when mitigating damages. They don’t have to go above and beyond their normal level.
  • Sometimes folks miscommunicate because “breaking a lease” can mean many things in regular conversation. If you are confused, ask if the other person means terminating the lease, canceling the lease, voiding the lease, subletting, or finding a new tenant to start a new lease on the property. Always get agreements in writing, so that if there is confusion later, you’ll have evidence of what your agreement meant at the time.
  • The landlord doesn’t have to make your unit available before their comparable units (so, if they have a bunch of 2-bedrooms in the same building to rent out, they can show theirs before your 2-bedroom). However, they do have to make your unit available. If someone asks about the specifics of your unit, (“is #305 available?” “I’d like a 2-bedroom that is on the second floor or above, with windows that face North”), then your unit must be identified as available.
Disclaimer: The information provided here is for informational purposes only. By using this free service, you agree to PadMapper’s terms and conditions. All PadBlogger content is provided on an “As Is” basis, without warranty, either expressed or implied, of any kind. While every effort is made to ensure that information contained within is correct, PadMapper does not guarantee the reliability or accuracy of any information provided and makes no representation or warranty about the content herein. Visitors should not substitute information on this website for personal legal advice. If you have a legal issue, you should seek legal counsel from an attorney in the state in which you reside.
Additional resources:
On Break Clauses
Breaking a Lease: For Tenants
Breaking a Lease and Leaving Early
What are dilapidations? 

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Renters Rights: Implied Warranty of Habitability

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As a renter, you’re entitled to certain things that might not explicitly be stated in your lease. It may not always be clear what these rights are. We’re going to do our best to make sure you know about as many of them as possible.

Implied warranty of what?

Habitability refers to the overall “liveableness” of a residence. The implied warranty of habitability requires landlords to ensure that their properties are in compliance with both local building codes and state statutes protecting tenants.

The fact that it is “implied” means that it may not be directly stated in your lease or any other form of contract, but it is still expected to be provided. In other words, habitability is a common law right.

Who decides the rules?

Depending on what state you’re living in, there are two main dictators of habitability:

  • State & local housing laws: include housing codes related to basic rights that include repairs, electricity, functioning bathrooms, and more.
  • Court decisions: in certain states, take tenant protection a step further by requiring landlords to comply with habitability conditions beyond basic codes. For example, if the residence is in a very wet climate, this could include waterproofing.

What exactly is included?

This changes by state, but there are some general statutes that tend to apply universally. Some of them are:

  • Drinkable water
  • Hot water
  • Heating during cold climate
  • Electricity
  • Smoke detectors
  • Functioning bathroom and toilet
  • Insect and/or rodent protection
  • Quality of floors, walls, and roof

You can find specific housing codes for your state here.

Another fact worth noting is that renting out an apartment ‘as-is’ could actually be a violation of this warrantee. If any of these are not being provided, even if you did rent a place ‘as-is,’ you could have grounds to break your lease or take legal action.

What does it all mean?

Put bluntly, the duty to pay rent is conditioned on the landlord’s duty to make the property habitable. This does not mean that you can stop paying rent if you feel that your rights are being violated, though. It simply means that if you do experience decreased habitability in some form and notify your landlord, he or she is required to repair the issue in a reasonable amount of time, which tends to hover around 30 days, depending on the severity of the situation.

If you do feel like your apartment does not meet the basic standards of habitability, let your landlord or property manager know immediately so that they can take the appropriate action. Typically, this goes very well! If not, you can likely use this as grounds to break your lease. As always, we’ll be there to help.

Disclaimer: The information provided here is for informational purposes only. By using this free service, you agree to PadMapper’s terms and conditions. All PadBlogger content is provided on an “As Is” basis, without warranty, either expressed or implied, of any kind. While every effort is made to ensure that information contained within is correct, PadMapper does not guarantee the reliability or accuracy of any information provided and makes no representation or warranty about the content herein. Visitors should not substitute information on this website for personal legal advice. If you have a legal issue, you should seek legal counsel from an attorney in the state in which you reside.

Doing Taxes Yourself Doesn’t Have To Be a Nightmare

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Who’s got two thumbs and does their own taxes?!

Gather your documents

The very first step to filing taxes is to get organized. You’ll need to reference a variety of different documents during this process, so it’s best to have them all set up and ready to go before you get started. The most important of these forms include:

  • W-2 form – used to report wage and salary information, as well as taxes that have been withheld from your paychecks.
  • 1099 form – reports any income outside of your salary. This can include freelance or contract work, interest, dividends, etc. There are different categories of 1099 forms that you can read more about here.
  • 1095 form – for those without health insurance, helps determine whether or not you need to comply with the shared responsibility payment under the Affordable Care Act. If you do have health insurance, this determines whether you’re eligible for a tax return or if you need to make a payment.

Beyond these, you’ll want to think about anything you did this year that might allow you to file for additional deductions. Some of these things include buying a house, getting married, providing childcare, or making charitable donations. For each of these, make sure you have the correct documentation of the event, expenditure, or donation (receipts, medical bills, etc). To read more about the different types of tax forms, check out this resource from Intuit.

Decide on your method

When you’re ready to get this show on the road, there are three filing options for you to choose from: filing via mail, filing online, or filing through a tax professional. Given that it’s 2017, you’ll likely end up going with one of the second two options. If you do choose the snail mail route, check here for the tax forms you’ll need to fill out as well as the address you’ll need in order to file.

There are a few different ways to file online, one of which includes IRS Free File. Depending on your income, you’ll either be able to use this software for free (income under $64,000), or use a ‘light’ version of it (income over $64,000) where you’ll have to do some of the extra work – mostly math – yourself. There is also another government assistance option called VITA, the Volunteer Income Tax Association, which is available for those who qualify.

Perhaps the most efficient way to file online is through a tax filing software. Some examples of this include TurboTax, TaxAct, H&R Block, and Credit Karma. Similar to IRS Free File, these programs offer different tiers of service based upon your adjusted gross income. The major benefit to paying for a service like this is that it will take you through the entirety of the process one step at a time, giving you very specific instructions along the way. For a first timer, the cost proves to be worth the guidance. I’ve personally filed with Turbo Tax in the past, and can vouch for the fact that, as long as you have all of your documents ready, you barely even need to think in order to get that tax return into your hands.

Of course, the option to hire a tax professional remains. One of the biggest reasons to go with a professional is to ensure that you are getting the absolute maximum amount of deductions possible, including those that you might have missed. There’s also the element of quality; if you run a small business, for example, you wouldn’t want anything to fall out of place during the process. That said, this can get pricey, especially for those of us filing our own taxes for the first time.

Read closely and document

The final element of filing your taxes involves keeping updated records of the taxes you pay. Typically, when you use a tax software, you’ll receive PDF files or even a CD containing all of your filled-out documents and all information you might need should you have to reference this tax filing in the future. Some instances where this will come in handy include taking out a loan for a house, or filing taxes in the future.

Remember, it’s okay to make a mistake or two, and in fact it’s quite common. Sometimes, you might even make a mistake and be corrected and given an even bigger return! Take it slow, read carefully, and keep track of everything you file, and you’ll be nailing this adult thing in no time.