In case you didn’t know it, it really pays to know your rights when it comes to renting a house or an apartment.

Every country has different laws and the person who wrote this story wasn’t about to be pushed around by his property manager in New Zealand.

Check out how he fought back after someone tried to screw him over.

Go to the tenancy tribunal? If you say so …

“New Zealand has some particularly predatory property managers.

Their prey is university students and young families who live in our bigger cities. There are stories in our news quite frequently about how poorly they treat tenants.

I spent my 20s living in rental properties in Wellington. Most of the houses I lived in were super damp, mold ridden heaps. They were also super expensive (they are even worse now).

But there’s some good news…

Fortunately, New Zealand has a fantastic tenancy tribunal who are sick of property managers preying on young people who do not have a lot of money.

When I was about 28, my (now) wife and I found a beautiful house in a suburb called Berhampore. Close to the city, quiet area, near a bus stop, plenty of space including a pretty garden in the back and, most importantly, not expensive.

A perfect house.

Just before we moved in I took about 200 photos of the house. I’d become very weary of how easily property managers could rake a tenant over the coals for damage, garbage etc the previous tenant left behind.

We spent a year and a half living there without incident. We had to report to the property manager that trash had been left under the house by the previous tenants, and they dealt with it well.

When we needed to install high-speed broadband they were easy to deal with and everything seemed to be going swimmingly.

About 4 months prior to the end of our lease, I was offered a brewing job in the United States. I informed our property manager that we would need to break our lease earlier than expected to which she replied, “no problem, let’s arrange a time to meet”.

He did his research.

Prior to meeting with her I researched her company’s policy on moving out of rental properties prior to the agreed date. The company policy was that if a tenant broke the agreement early then the tenant would have to pay $750 to the property manager.

This was supposedly to cover the listing fee. I should mention at this point that listing properties in Wellington was not challenging, nor expensive. Most properties were filled within a week.

Some property managers were even expecting people to show up with cash to cover Bond plus first month’s rent when they were having viewings of the property. There was no way that $750 was going towards just the listing fee.

When I went into our meeting, I told her that we were willing to ensure the property was cleaner than when we arrived, and also we were willing to offer an extra $200 for moving out prior to the lease ending.

At that point she showed me the company policy which stated leaving prior to the end of the agreed lease date would mean a $750 fee for us as the tenants.

He wasn’t happy about this.

I acted flabbergasted, as one would, to hear of this shocking news. At this point our property manager explained to me that the tenants before my wife and I were in a similar situation and had left prior to the agreed date. I explained to her that this was extortion and I thought it was incredibly unfair.

I repeated to her that we had offered her $200 to help with re-listing the property and that we were willing to list it ourselves. I also said to her that it was ridiculous to think that it would cost more than $100 to list and fill that property.

She explained to me “that is what the tenants before you did (paid the $750) and that’s just what everyone does.”

To which I replied “just because everyone else does it doesn’t mean it’s right.”

We argued some more and left it unresolved. On my way out of her office she said, “if this is still an issue, you should get in touch with the tenancy tribunal”.

You got it!

With the rage of a thousand suns, and the ability to bottle emotions like a true Catholic, I managed to respond, “I’ll do that”.

As soon as I got home, I went on to the tenancy tribunal website and filed a complaint against the company she represented. Within a day, the tribunal had agreed to help me and contacted the property manager.

In turn, she emailed me begging for mercy. “If you agree to drop the complaint, we won’t charge you anything. The owner is very disappointed, but if you leave the house in a good state there will be no more issues”.

We’re not absolute trash, so of course we cleaned the place thoroughly.

We moved out without paying them a dime. But the real reward came when I saw her in the city and greeted her with a big smile and wave.

I didn’t think I had the power of invisibility but she didn’t seem to see me at all.”

Check out what folks had to say about this on Reddit.

This person shared their thoughts.

Another reader asked a question.

This Reddit user spoke up.

Another individual had a lot to say.

And this person weighed in.

Good tenants are hard to find…so it’s a good idea to treat them well!

If you liked that post, check out this post about a woman who tracked down a contractor who tried to vanish without a trace.