Legal Question in Landlord & Tenant Law in California

Hello. I own a two-story single family home in Los Angeles that I currently rent out to a family. The house is approx 2600 sq ft, and I put in brand new condenser unit last year. During the heat wave over last week, my manager received a call from the tenant complaining that the AC was not cooling down the second floor of the house. I sent my licensed AC contractor over to check. He noted that the upstairs temperature was 80 degrees at the time, prior to him servicing the unit. He found that the unit had a dirty filter which he changed. Afterwards, he verified that the unit is otherwise in good functioning condition, and air is flowing out of all vents at 55 degrees.

The tenant has since complained to my manager that he feels the upstairs is still too hot, and assert that we are providing inadequate AC. He is asking for rent reduction for this, and he is threatening to sue.

I feel that I have fulfilled my responsibilities as landlord to provide a functioning AC unit and cannot be expected to make certain that during the hottest days of the year, every upstairs room is cooled down to an arbitrary point of the tenant's choosing. I think on a day when the outside temp in 100, the AC cooling down the stairs to 80 degrees is reasonable.

Does the tenant have a case? Is there anything further that I should do as the owner? Thank you for any advice.


Asked on 9/12/12, 10:35 am

1 Answer from Attorneys

The tenant has no case. AC is not a condition of habitability the way heat is. If you want to avoid further trouble if possible, however, I suggest you have your HVAC person go over there one more time and see if he can do something about the air balance in the system, i.e. send more air upstairs. Some systems have duct dampers that can be adjusted to control how much of the cool air goes which way in the ducts. Where such adjustments are available, it is good practice to adjust the air flow twice a year, once to send extra cool air up stairs in the summer and once to send extra warm air downstairs in the winter.

Read more
Answered on 9/12/12, 11:34 am


Related Questions & Answers

More Landlord & Tenants questions and answers in California