What happens if you are hurt in a fire in a rental property?
Renting your home, whether it's an apartment in a multi-unit building or a stand-alone house, means that your landlord has responsibility for a lot of the maintenance and basic services within the property.
Tenants trust that their landlords will maintain their units in compliance with state and local laws. Occasionally, that trust leads to people getting hurt. Sometimes, landlords don't appropriately follow through with their obligations to provide critical household appliances and services to their tenants.
Smoke detectors are a critical safety feature
In Texas, landlords have an obligation to
supply and properly maintain smoke detectors in rental units. After all, these devices may be the only warning if a fire breaks out when people in the unit are asleep. Smoke detectors are critical to the safety of tenants, and landlords should prioritize maintaining them. When they fail to do so, their tenants are often the ones who suffer.
Thousands of people lose their lives every year in fires, often because they don't have adequate warning. Smoke detectors can help give people enough time to get out of the property without being injured and possibly even to put out the fire before it spreads throughout their home and destroys their property.
Early warning can protect you, your family and your property
If your landlord did not have a working smoke detector in your unit and you suffered massive property damages or someone in your family was hurt as a result, you may have the right to hold them accountable for their neglect by
pursuing a civil case against them. An experienced attorney can help you.