Well, don't I feel VIOLATED.

[buggery]

So my apartment was broken into today.

I know who did it, or at least who enabled it; whoever it was used a key, and locked the apartment again when they left, and the lock's a deadbolt. Whoever used the key works for my building's management company.

New faucet attachments had been installed throughout the building a couple of weeks ago that have been making the hot water fail to work properly, and they'd told us earlier in the week that they would be coming to remove them soon, but not specified when. The new attachments are now gone from my kitchen and bathroom spigots, which, aside from how freaked out my cat was when I arrived home an hour and a half ago, is how I know someone was in here.

As far as I know, nothing was taken, nobody appears to have rifled through my underwear drawer, and I'm just hoping there's not a new micro-cam in my bedroom or bathroom.

Nevertheless.

In my building, as, I should think, in most apartments, residents specify in writing whether management is allowed to enter the apartment when they are not home. Management can enter in an emergency in any case, but many people understandably don't want to leave the door open (so to speak) to have someone enter their home without their prior knowledge or consent.

I've always indicated that I do not want management to enter my apartment when I am not present. I just discussed this with someone at the main office for our management company on Monday -- they'd been wanting to do a routine inspection, and, partly because I didn't know they were trying to do so, they'd had bad luck just coming by and knocking on the door to find I wasn't home. They're perfectly well aware that they don't have permission to enter the apartment.

Before I left this afternoon -- to go out to lunch and do some errands -- I stopped by the on-site manager's office downstairs to give her my schedule for next week, so that they could arrange a time when both management and I were available. The building's superintendent, who usually effects any needed repairs as well as accompanying the on-site manager to inspections, was in the manager's office. Neither of them mentioned that there were any plans to remove the attachments today, nor asked if I was going to be around. Yet still, mere hours later, either they or other employees of the building's management company illegally entered my apartment.

Clearly, the malfunctioning attachments did not constitute an emergency situation; if they had, management would have gone into apartments to remove them earlier in the week.

I'll be filing a police report about the break-in tomorrow. As anyone who's ever had a break-in knows, you don't always notice immediately everything (or anything) that's been taken, and there's also the possibility of surveillance equipment being placed illegally in one's home -- we've all heard those horror stories about handymen putting recording equipment in renters' apartments in order to have a free show. Having a timely police report on file is, if not strictly necessary, certainly helpful in pursuing further legal action if it should turn out that any crime beyond the simple trespass was committed.

Perhaps most important of all, pursuing legal action should hopefully reinforce the importance to my building's management of respecting their residents' privacy rights.

Edited to add: I've now made my report to the local police about the break-in. Thanks to everyone who's expressed sympathy and/or righteous indignation on my behalf. Having my feelings validated has been really important. ::hugs you all::

Comments

[spykeraven.livejournal.com]

My deepest sympathies. One of the most difficult battles I fought with my landlady was whether or not she should have a key to the locks I installed on the door. In the end she kindly agreed not to, and I'm glad because, yeurgh, the thought of anyone looking through my things on a whim makes me feel very ugly.

Am sending good vibes your way and hoping the police report does indeed make a difference.

[buggery.livejournal.com]

Well, it's not at all a bad idea for somebody to have keys to all your locks, in case of an emergency. But there's a difference between having and using. In my building, there are 150 apartments, and maintenance and management have master keys that open both the front and rear entrances and residents' actual apartments. Because the apartment doors are steel, it would be very difficult for a resident to install an additional lock (and we're forbidden in our leases from doing so anyway). We're even discouraged from having door-chains or push-bars inside the apartment, though a previous tenant had installed one in my apartment and management didn't remove it before I moved in. Things being as they are, though, I'm a lot less comfortable with how many people have access to those master keys than I used to be.