You are at risk of incurring huge fines of $450.00 or more for nuisance ordinance violations without warning and without time to cure.
Additionally your property is in jeopardy of being placed into the Probationary Rental Occupancy Permit (PROP) program: at a cost of $500.00 per year per unit. Please sign this petition to let the city council know that this is unacceptable and it is unfair to levy fines against us without a chance to fix the problem.
We the undersigned,
Request that the PROP ordinance be eliminated and that nuisance violations be given a time to cure before imposing a fine.
As landlords we can not physically control our tenants%u2019 behavior, all of our tenants are told to keep their apartment clean inside and out. If there is a mess left overnight or the tenant leaves debris or furniture out in front of the house, it is not fair to fine the landlord such a huge sum of money without warning or a chance to remedy. Worse yet, a vindictive tenant can literally bankrupt a landlord by not keeping the area clean.
Additionally we would like to make a general comment regarding fines:
We understand that the city is trying to improve the quality of life in Raleigh. Landlords in the area are trying to improve the quality of life as well, so most landlords and the city are aligned in that matter.
Imposing such huge penalties on a landlord will not improve the quality of Raleigh neighborhoods, in fact it will eventually produce the opposite effect, if the landlords are burdened with such hefty fines without a chance to remedy the violation, there will not be money to make improvements to the property and worse yet owners will not be able to make their mortgage payment and we will have more foreclosed and vacant properties in Raleigh. The average rental unit only produces a net income of $50.00 - $100.00 per month.
I hope that we can come up with a better solution to improving the neighborhood. I would suggest a different system, such as a warning to the landlord and giving a number of days to cure, and then impose a fine if the violation is not cured within the specified amount of days. At least if there is a violation, the landlord has time to fix it. That will help the landlords that are trying to improve the area. The landlords that don%u2019t care will accrue fines for not addressing the violations.
