need advice

Well things got better for us for awhile but things seem to have gotten worse again and I'm not sure what to do. Here's where we are today...

Since our move the gov't has taken away all our child tax benefits because hubby still owes taxes from when he was self employed. I am still working part time (as many shifts as I can do) and hubby up to recently was still working 2 jobs. He quit the 2nd job because I work every weekend and when he worked his 2nd job we always ended up having to pay for a sitter so there wasn't much point. We pay $1200 in rent and after that is paid we have hardly anything left for food and bills, we are behind on bills because of it and our freezer is pretty empty lately.

We have signed a 2yr contract with our landlord but we are finding that $1200 is too high for us to pay right now to be able to live comfortably. I'm afraid if I go to my landlord with this 1..he'll be angry and won't provide a good reference...2.he'll keep our damage deposit for breaking the contract which will make it impossible to move from here as we have no money for another damage deposit.

I'm getting stressed out over all of this once again, at first we were doing so much better we actually had a little spending money for the occasional night out, now we are back to square one and living pay to pay, we have exactly $20 to last us till Friday. What should I do? Go to the landlord with this or struggle through until at least one year is up and then see if we can move?? Any advice is appreciated.

The gov is taking your ctc? I didn't think even they could touch that.

Is there any way you could possibly sublet where you are? Throw an ad on Kijiji and see what happens. If not, maybe the landlord would actually be nice enough to let you out early. We have a place here in London that will actually lend you money for rent up to two months and you pay it back monthly (you have to be behind two months to get the money though). Not exactly sure where you are, so that doesn't help much.

ivegotfleas1 wrote:

The gov is taking your ctc? I didn't think even they could touch that.

Is there any way you could possibly sublet where you are? Throw an ad on Kijiji and see what happens. If not, maybe the landlord would actually be nice enough to let you out early. We have a place here in London that will actually lend you money for rent up to two months and you pay it back monthly (you have to be behind two months to get the money though). Not exactly sure where you are, so that doesn't help much.

yes they've taken both the universal child tax and the other one.
We are in MB, from what I've read every renter has the right to sublet but if he keeps our damage deposit we cannot move anyway because we don't have any money for the next deposit.
We aren't behind on rent but I have asked him (the last 3mths) to hold off cashing it until my husbands payday, sometimes as late as a week past the first of the month. He's never been angry about it but I feel extremely bad about not having it on the first of every month. Once rent is paid there is very little left for our family of 4.

Why not try and see if he'll negotiate the rent with you. If you leave before your contract is up, it will screw with your credit and make it even harder to rent in the future as that is what landlords look for is if you owe back rent, skipped out, etc.

You could find a person to take over your lease in which case, they could pay you the damage deposit and they will get it back when they leave the place and your butt won't be on the line for them.

kbullet wrote:

Why not try and see if he'll negotiate the rent with you. If you leave before your contract is up, it will screw with your credit and make it even harder to rent in the future as that is what landlords look for is if you owe back rent, skipped out, etc.

You could find a person to take over your lease in which case, they could pay you the damage deposit and they will get it back when they leave the place and your butt won't be on the line for them.

I'm hoping that's what he'll suggest, lowering the rent a bit but I somehow doubt he will. I am very worried for that reason Bullet I want to have a good reference from him since we are taking great care of the house and this is our first time renting in 6 years, even though we were home owners for 5 years, landlords prefer renters that have a good history. I was just reading that if we sublet and the tenant damages the place, we are still responsible for the damages. I didn't know that I thought once the landlord accepted the new tenant it was up to the new tenant to pay any damages that they have caused at the end of their lease. It may be hard to find a tenant willing to take on a sublet that is over a year long.

I am with bullet on this one,I would talk to the landlord and see if he will agree to lower the rent even for a little while,most landlords would rather take a little less and have good renters than all and have the place trashed

It never hurts to ask Smurry,the worst he can do is say No

I would talk with the landlord and see if he could lower the rent first. I hate the thought of subleasing, only because if the person you sublet to decides to skip out or damage the place, not only are you responsible for the rent in the place you are moving to but you might also responsible for covering the rent for the place you are staying at now, and responsible for the damages. I'm not very trusting of people I don't know well, so leary about the sublet option but if you have to go that route, then keep it as an option.

Ask for the rent to be lowered just for the next 5 to 6 months, have either you or your spouse work a full-time day job, while the other looks to work full-time midnights. That might be the only way to get things into control for the both of you without burn out and not have to worry about babysitter costs. Just explain that your husband lost his second job and this is the only reason you are asking for the rent to be temporarily lowered. That if things get back on track sooner, that you will start paying the $1200 a month rent sooner. Keep in mind that if the landlord agrees to lowering the rent, you cannot miss a payment or ask him to not cash the cheque until a certain day. It has to be ready to be cashed on time.

First off Hugs girl I know how hard stress can weigh on a family first hand so my heart goes out to you all. Second is there any way you could speak with the landlord explaining your circumstances and even ask for just 100.00 off the rent monthly on a short term basis that you could 'catch up' with your income tax refund in a few months or will that be taken as well?

I'm so sorry to hear of this rough patch and I really wish there was some brain wave way of helping you out that I can think of but with it being so soon after Christmas I'm sure a lot of families are struggling right now. I truly wish I could help more.

I'm terrified to ask him to lower the rent because at the time we were looking, this was the only landlord willing to give us a chance. He chose us over a student that was offering to pay him $100 over what he was asking for rent but since he liked us and wanted a family in his home he asked us if we would be willing to pay $50 more then the ad stated, we agreed because we were panicking and didn't know if we'd find another place if we didn't accept this one.

I know we need to just ask but I feel so guilty


SillyStorm thank you but do not feel sorry for us, we spent years getting ourselves into this mess, it's going to take years to get out of it. There are many things I still need to work out, I just wish it wasn't so hard. The first step was the sale of the house, I just wish we could have afforded this rent for the remainder of our lease so that we'd have an excellent reference when we moved from here. Because without a good reference we will have a tough time finding another rental with poor credit.

BigBrownEyes29 wrote:

I would talk with the landlord and see if he could lower the rent first. I hate the thought of subleasing, only because if the person you sublet to decides to skip out or damage the place, not only are you responsible for the rent in the place you are moving to but you might also responsible for covering the rent for the place you are staying at now, and responsible for the damages. I'm not very trusting of people I don't know well, so leary about the sublet option but if you have to go that route, then keep it as an option.

Ask for the rent to be lowered just for the next 5 to 6 months, have either you or your spouse work a full-time day job, while the other looks to work full-time midnights. That might be the only way to get things into control for the both of you without burn out and not have to worry about babysitter costs. Just explain that your husband lost his second job and this is the only reason you are asking for the rent to be temporarily lowered. That if things get back on track sooner, that you will start paying the $1200 a month rent sooner. Keep in mind that if the landlord agrees to lowering the rent, you cannot miss a payment or ask him to not cash the cheque until a certain day. It has to be ready to be cashed on time.

The only problem with full time nights is our kids are 3 (almost) and 5 so I wouldn't be able to sleep during the day since I will have my daughter all day and my son only attends school in the mornings (Kindergarten). I did nights while my husband was on evenings and even though he was home in the mornings I was only getting 4-5hrs (sometimes even less) a day and by the end of the week I was a miserable witch

I am working as many hours as I can right now and hubby works full time days with an extra hour a day of overtime.

I have to figure out a nice way of asking our landlord to lower the rent if even for a little while, like you have all said all he can do is say no. Thanks everyone for the advice.

The worst he'll say is no. If thats the case, see if he'd be willing to let you find a suitable person to take over the remainder of the lease (with a good reference from him) completely removing you from the situation and creating no loss for him. If he is willing to do that, get the deposit from the new people, sign over your deposit to them and find yourself some where you can afford.

Smurry, hang in there and keep your chin up. <<hugs>>