Question
i am a full tiem college student living in an apartment complex is south bend, indiana. there is a common laundry room for each building, and each apartment has its own storage cabinet in this room to store personal items. i had some hockey equipment in this cabinet. the wood door was broken to get into the cabinet and the equipment was stolen. the lease for the apartment states that they are not responsible for items in that storage area, but I feel that their negligence contributed to the theft. the laundry rooms are all supposed to be locked, with keys given to each resident of that building. i was given a laundry key when I moved in. for some reason, our laundry room does not have a lock, so it is open for anyone to walk into. obviously if the lock had been in place, no one except those living in my building. all the other buildings have functioning locks on their laundry/storage rooms. Is there any way to recoup the cost of replacing the equipment from the apartment complex? does the fact that only our laundry room has no lock make them partly responsible?
Answer
You'll probably have better luck and quicker responses from the landlord/tenant issue board.
In my experience as a renter though, you will probably not be able to recover from them. They made you aware that storing is at your own risk. If you felt they were negligent in securing it, you probably wouldn't/shouldn't have stored your stuff there in the first place. Your renters insurance should cover it. You do have renters insurance, right?
Answer
Probably no renters insurance! No one ever thinks of these things! Why should the landlord be responsible for expensive (I gather) sports equipement you left behind whether it in a storage or not..... Plus who is to say that someone in your building didn't take the equipement. Get smart and buy insurance. It is no more expensive then the couple of six packs I would almost bet my life is in your frig!