The Glade 4.0

After a very (very) long day at work, I finally got home around 8:30p. I picked up some Chipotle on the way home, Phe warmed up some leftovers for herself, and we settled in to eat dinner and catch up on episodes of The Daily Show.

Two hours later, we heard what has to be one of the most dread-inducing sounds a home can make: the mewling, incessant chirp of a smoke detector whose battery is dying.

DO NOT WANT.

Now, here's the thing: in most houses, fine. I just grab my trusty 4' ladder, hop up there and replace the damn thing. Not this house, oh no. The ceilings on the second floor of this joint run close to twenty feet high (probably higher in places). And was the malfunctioning smoke detector on the ground floor? Nope.

It is, of course, upstairs. Better than fifteen feet high. Trusty 4' ladder, you have failed me.

So after better than ten minutes of it's beeping, I call the landlord (this is around 10:15p). Obviously, with such high ceilings, there are concessions made to do things like change light bulbs, etc., as he left one of those poles you use for such a task. I called to ask him if he'd likewise stashed away a ladder I hadn't found for just such an occasion.

Unfortunately, no, he had not. He said he'd come over with his ladder and fix it, but that it would be tomorrow morning. I reiterated that this is the smoke detector over our bedroom door, and that we wouldn't really be able to sleep with it singing to us all night, but thanked him. He's a really nice guy, and while I certainly wouldn't want to leave my family and drive twenty minutes to fix such a problem if I were the landlord, I would do it, in a mitigating circumstance such as this. You have a light that won't come on? Yeah, that can be taken care of the morning. You have a maintenance issue preventing you from sleeping? That's a more immediate concern. In my eyes, at least.

I told him that I appreciated the offer, but something had to be done tonight, or we wouldn't be able to get any sleep. I said we'd just have to find a place that was open at this time of night (the Super Target had already closed) and buy a ladder ourselves. Again, I didn't get mad with him or anything, just a bit frustrated that we'd have to go out and spend our own money and time to fix a maintenance issue that by rights he should rectify.

We got dressed, managed to find a Super Walmart online, and went out to pick up a new ladder. The smallest they had that would reach was 13', and cost $93. I bought it and we returned home (we already had 9v batteries).

Phe came on inside and I unloaded the ladder from the car (one of those A-frame dealies). It took a bit to get it through the laundry room and into the foyer, then I set it down, found scissors, and returned...and something dawned on me. I'd been in the house for a good five minutes and hadn't heard the chirping of that hideous horn.

Phe and I have continued waiting, and the damnable sound hasn't yet re-emerged. So I sent the landlord a text saying that we went out and bought a ladder, which was $100, but upon returning home, the chirping has ceased. We're going to try to make it through the night, and if we don't incur the wrath of the smoke detector gods, we'll send for the landlord in the morning to fix it himself with his ladder, and we'll return ours and get our money back (as I hadn't yet unwrapped it...yay!). If not, we'll use the ladder ourselves.

Phe thinks the same as I: this is something of a mitigating circumstance, and that the maintenance should have occurred tonight. To those ends, she thinks we should try to have the cost of the ladder removed from the rent. I can see both sides...he did offer to fix it, but not in what I would consider to be a timely manner in such a situation.

What say you, o denizens of the Glade? What is appropriate here (or at least would have been, had the chirping not ceased)?

The ladder's a durable good. If you were to keep it, you'll find it useful later, whether in this rented place, or a home of your own for outdoor work.

If you keep it, don't bother taking it off your rent. Instead, it's simply an early investment in a useful tool. It'll probably be easier than dealing with the light changer pole, too.

If you do return it, the gas money you spent and a reasonable amount of time driving to and fro are the price of your good night's sleep. Write it off.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

If it was a water leak or something that was a health hazard or something, I could see getting him to come over right away.
As it is, it's an annoyance, and for him to offer to come over to fix it in the morning seems perfectly reasonable, whereas asking him to drive 20 min at 10pm at night for something like this doesn't seem, in my opinion, to be a reasonable request, nor does asking him to reimburse you for the ladder.
Frustrating as heck though...I wouldn't be able to sleep with noise like that either. Hope it stays away all night and hopefully you can take the ladder back for a refund.

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"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus of Nazareth

I think if you're going to pick up something for yourself, you should pick up something for your wife, too. That is definitely your responsibility.

It's always good to have a tall ladder, though.

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Well, if we took it off the rent, we'd leave it with the townhouse, his property.

Personally, I value my sleep really highly. Particularly on Friday nights (I run pretty much full throttle during the week, then crash on the weekends). Hence why we went out and dropped $100 on a ladder (thank God we can do that now). But which is more unreasonable, expecting someone to drive twenty minutes to fix their property, or expecting two people to give up a night's sleep so that one person (whose responsibility it is to take care of such matters) doesn't have to drive twenty minutes (I should also note that it took us far longer than 20 minutes to go out to Walmart at the same time of night, and cost $100 to boot).

He's a really nice guy, and I don't think either side here is wrong...I've just not been in this particular situation before, and was curious as to others' input.

If its that big a deal, go to Walgreens and get a set of $2 earplugs and let the landlord deal with it in the AM.

Its unreasonable to expect him to come out at 10pm to fix a minor annoyance.

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Holy shitsnacks!

Naturally. However, if I were the landlord, I'd prefer you discussed buying things on my behalf before doing so, rather than making the purchase, and then declaring that it's now my property and I better pay you for it. I've already got a ladder, you know?

In other words, if you wanted to pursue this option, I think the right approach to do it would be, when you call him up and he offers to come out in the morning, you say "Well, we need the sleep. Would it be okay if I went out and got a ladder, and we took it off the rent? Then you can skip the visit tomorrow, and we'll have a ladder on-hand here for the future. When we move out, it stays here for the next tenant, too."

If he agrees, all is hunky dory. But I don't think "buy now, ask forgiveness later" is a good thing to do with somebody else's money.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

No, and when I wrote "demand" in the poll options, I was being uncharitable. I don't particularly appreciate my options being "spend $100" or "lose a night of sleep," but in such a case I would go buy the ladder regardless, and ask him to remove it from the rent. If he agreed, excellent, everything is copacetic. If not, well, I've bought myself a night's sleep for $100 (would have been cheaper to just spend the night in the Holiday Inn Express up the street), though I've blown an inordinate amount on a ladder that I shouldn't have had to purchase, and now own a(nother) ladder.

Eh, c'est la vie. Going to sleep and hopefully not be awoken by the Ghost of Smoke Detectors Past.

Meh, use it as an excuse to take Phe to a really nice hotel and pamper her with a spa treatment or something..

Or, at the opposite end of the spectrum, go pitch a tent somewhere and enjoy a night under the stars. =)

But, yea, those alarms are frustrating. I live in a 4 unit Condo and mine are wired into the building power, and only use batteries for backup. They make a racket that will wake the dead and make zombies flee in fear. There is no ignoring them. Fortunately, none of mine require scaffolding to get to them, and I keep a spare batter stashed nearby for each of the four detectors.

I voted for "deal with it" by I really do empathize with you. =)

This. Most leases say that for an emergency they will come out. Sadly, the annoyance may prevent sleep, but is not an emergency.

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Darksiege
Traveller, Calé, Whisperer
Lead me not into temptation; for I know a shortcut

I'm not sure what the terms of your lease are, but under any of the leases I've had/seen, this wouldn't fall under the landlords responsibility to replace. It would be his responsibility to ensure that it worked on your moving in, but your responsibility to maintain after that.

Seeing as it requires something special to maintain it (ladder), I can see asking him to come out and replace it.... But not "requiring" him to do it late at night.

Having to buy a ladder sucks, but I had to shell out around $100 for stuff to maintain our new house when we moved in- I needed a taller ladder than I had to get to the air filter to replace it, needed something to change the high lightbulbs, etc. That's just part of the norm, to me.

Like I said, I don't know the terms of your lease- yours may be different. But as LK (and others) mentioned, it's not like this is a water leak or something.

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Darksiege: You are not a god damned vulcan homie.

First impression having not yet read all the responses:

-Ladder that you can afford without too much problem - Keep it, you will need it in the future. Don't bother asking to have the cost reimbursed.

-I should know more about landlord\tenent relationships, I rented for a good many years. Honestly, though, I don't remember a situation such as this at an unreasonable hour. I guess I'd lean towards it being the landlord's responsibility because, if left unfixed, it will affect your sleep. What if it was a broken lock on the front door? Though it's not physically impairing your sleep, I know Oonagh wouldn't be able to sleep knowing that the front door couldn't be locked. Landlord should have fixed it.

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This must be Thursday. I could never get the hang of Thursdays.

You should have replaced the battery before it was discharged enough to start beeping, if you were in this house over a year. If you weren't, then the landlord should have come over at 10.

There are all sorts of public service announcements during the DST time change about doing so.

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In time, this too shall pass.

They moved in in June. Just sayin'.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

You couldn't have dislodged the battery with what you had (a 4 ft ladder and a long stick?

I wouldn't just take it off the rent. I'd ask him once if he wants to keep the ladder and pay for it in the form of less rent or if you should just return it. Whatever he says just say "okay, cool" and go on with your life.

If he says to return it, you can decide for yourself if you actually do.

Overall you probably have to be prepared to write this off as one of the "joys" of living in a bigger space.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Then the landlord should have come over.

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In time, this too shall pass.

Nah, these things are built like bricks. I probably could have beaten it to death, but I didn't figure destroying it was the way to go.

Where is the option for let it die and put a new one in a reasonable location?

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It's the kind that's wired into the house. The place is lousy with 'em (five or six).

Most of 'em aren't that high, though. Just that one little bastard.

Contrary to some of the other opinions voiced here, a smoke detector is a safety prevention device that protects the lives of the tenants. The fact that it is malfunctioning is an emergency and should be dealt with immediately. ~If~ it had not been making noise, I might even take the chance of getting a nights sleep without it, but knowing it was not working probably would have kept me up / ruined my sleep as every noise would have put me on high alert.

It is your (and Phe's) life we are talking about here and don't feel bad at all about making the decision you made for whatever reason you made it. Personally, I've found that owning my own 12 foot ladder to be extremely useful and I would have made the purchase because it was needed for the immediate job and in the future. Also, if you owned the place yourself, you would have gone out and purchased the ladder to fix the problem, so no biggie there. If money was tight (I've been there), I still would have made the purchase, then negotiated with the landlord to pay me back or take it off the next rent payment.

P.S. I voted B based on the fact that you don't have the money to spend. But, D or a D until negotiated to B probably would have been what we would have done if the budget was tight. With the money to spend, I would have done A.

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Gorse

I think having a non-emergency maintenance problem fixed the following morning is excellent landlord service. It may feel like an emergency, but it is not.

That's assuming it was "chirping" and not sounding the full alarm.

Anyway, if you can't wait long enough to give the landlord a reasonable amount of time to address the issue, the cost then becomes yours to bear.

That's my view, anyway.

I think this is being a little overly dramatic. It's not like the alarm wasn't working, or he had to disable it. It's connected to building power. The backup battery was just in need of replacement, which can wait until morning.

The only immediate concern is the jarring sound these things make, which will certainly prevent a good nights sleep.

There is a big difference between "The smoke/fire/Co2 sensors aren't working at all, and our lives are in danger", and "There is this gawd-awful racket that is keeping me from sleeping".

That said, if I were the landlord, I would have probable come and taken care of it. However, it isn't something I would demand of one...

Just a random thought...this is what I picture in my head everytime you talk about your house, Farsky:

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"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus of Nazareth

Nowhere near enough pink for Phe.

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The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself. B. Franklin

"A mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone." -- Tyrion Lannister, A Game of Thrones

Oooh, that's pretty. Not our house, but our townhouse is quite nice (though underfurnished ), and the location is absolutely lovely.

The downside?