Exploitative Rental

<p>My family found a rental property through Remax in Montclair, Durban which was available from 1 January 2017. We (my wife as a signatory) signed the contract on 26 December 2016 and the landlord and Remax failed to signed this contract by 1 January 2017 although they had verbally agreed to the rental arrangement. Whilst the lease agreement (contract) clearly states that payment is due when all parties have signed the lease agreement but I was forced and coerced to pay the rental and deposit without a signed agreement. I was also forced to divert from the contract which states that the money must be paid to the agencies account and instead was told to pay the deposit to the agency (Remax) and rental money direct to the landlord as she wanted to fix the broken things in the house for us to live in a properly habitable house. On 1 January 2017 as we were moving into the property, this property still had furniture inside and the agent on site (property manager) from Remax had no idea to whom those belonged. I asked him to arrange for those to be removed but he never did anything until I had to use my own labour to clear the house and had to pay them an extra which I am demanding from Remax as the property manager. Since they refused to entertain it then I also did not pay their administration fee. The rental fee was determined on the basis of us occupying the house and the garage but on the day of moving in, the agent had no idea where was the garage key and when I managed to open the garage, the garage was full of furniture belonging to the tenants who rare renting the outside/back room. When I enquire from them, I was told they were also told that they can use the garage. Until this day, this issue is not sorted. The main house that we are renting had several broken things and we agreed to prioritise 3 things that were of critical imporatnce to us and these were 1. the toilet which was not working and needed to be replaced, 2. the keys to the front door for our security to lock at night and during the day when we have to vacate the house and 3. taps for filling water in the bathtubs. The agent noted these and the landlord was informed about them. However, until today she refuses to fix these and only demand that we pay rent or leave the house if we have a problem with that. We have made categorically clear to the landlord that we will not pay the current month rental until these broken things which the agent committed to sort out within the 1st week of January but obviously failed sighting reasons that the landlord have financial problems since she had to use the money we paid to pay her debts as the previous tenants had not paid rent for 3 months. Even more malicious regarding this situation is that the agent and the agency have resorted to ************ and in the process seriously impaired our dignity as he came here last night with the police (SAPS) to submit an undated letter with no name of who is the originator and this letter indicates that we have failed twice to pay rent in time which is blatant and misrepresentation of the truth and further states that all the attempts to contacts us have received no response and these are wilfully,malicious and deceiving as we have stated that they should come fix these things as we can't be charged for rent whilst living in unacceptable conditions. I have had a meeting on 13 January 2017 with the Owner and CEO of this Remax franchise office as I sent them my compain regarding this bad service from one of their agent and he (CEO) indicated that this agent was not experience in rental and would replce him with the guy who deals with rentals and since then there has never been communication from the agent and last night (invasion of my privacy) he shows up with the police and I am stilling going to seek answers from the station commander on what was the role of the police and why they even came here with this agent delivering a letter which he (agent) knows that the contents of that letter is far from the truth. It was my assertion then to the Agency CEO that this agent is *********** and has failed to serve my interest as a tenant and this I will forward to the Estate Agency Affairs Board in order for them to investigate if the code of conduct has not been violated by the agent and the agency (Remax). </p>