[throwmamatrain]

Good landlord, you're fine.

Bad landlord, they say you over inflated it, and are now behind on rent. This gives them the opening to evict, or you have to take to small claims, or your local tenant's rights group.

Not fun.

[hash872]

Going to court over this in California, New York or Massachusetts:

You: Here are 3 emails I sent documenting the problem and asking for it to be fixed, here's a 4th email stating I would be hiring the handyman myself if it wasn't fixed, here's the 5th email with the invoice

Landlord: (who cares. Also they don't have an attorney because the cost of an attorney in court exceeds the repair by a huge margin)

Magistrate (in the 15-20 minutes you get in small claims or housing court): Landlord, you are fined $5000 for not fixing the issue fast enough. Next fine is $10k if you don't shape up. Dismissed

[runako]

That's great for the 20% of Americans that live in those states. In many of the other states, you're evicted and looking to find another rental that will take you even though you were just evicted for not paying rent.