>... Now we come to you for help in another way.  We have had ferrets in
>our apartment for over two years with a doctor's note stating they were
>to assist me physically and psychologically in dealing with the unknown
>ailments I suffer from.  It has now been decided that you can "get a
>doctor to write anything you want" and letting us have these animals,
>when everybody else is limited to one pet, is showing "favoritism".
>Even though are apartment manager and the apartment owner approves of
>our ferret family, the management company has put their foot down and is
>determined to see the ferrets go.
 
Unfortunately what it all comes down to is what does the signed lease
agreement say??  If it says *only 2 pets* and you have nothing else in
writing from the landlord/property management saying you are allowed an
exception they can do whatever they want about the animals whenever they
want.  We had a similar problem in our last rental home.  The property
manager said that since the ferrets spent time in a cage they would not
be a problem or covered by the pet clause in our lease.  We were very
clear up front that we had these animals and were told they would not be
a problem.  Regrettably we did not get the property manager to write this
into our lease agreement.  A year and a half after we had been living
there management came into our unit due to a serious problem we were
having with maintenance, noticed the ferrets and immediately threatened
to throw us out if we did not remove the animals.  At this point we
stated that we had made the animals presence clear to the property
manager and were told "So what?", because it wasn't written down
anywhere.  We did move them out temporarily (we went away for 2 weeks and
boarded the ferrets while away), but moved them back in when we came back
and put them upstairs in another location out of the way.  This worked
for us until we bought our own house a year later, but by doing so we
were on the edge and if found out could have been evicted immediately if
found out.  Just another sad example of stupid landlord management.
 
I would recommend you contact a lawyer.  Many lawyers will offer free
consultations on such matters and can offer some advice.  Your position
may be different due to your doctor's recommendation of the pets as
"service/healing" animals.  If the lawyer says you do have a legal leg
to stand on you will still need to go to court to fight your pets being
evicted and to state your case for your animals as service animals.  Good
luck if you get this far.  If you can get your doctor to testify on your
behalf about the animals you would certainly be looking much better.
Yes moving is an option to a place with better pet rules, but those can
certainly be hard to find and moving is yet another hassle in life that
is not something that you want to have to do just to prove a point.
Hehe.
 
Good luck in dealing with this.  Tenant law can be annoying, but as a
tenant you really do have more power than most landlords want you to
believe.  It does vary from state to state so definitely talk to a lawyer
in your area!
 
Butch
Zoe and the cats George, Kiku and Callie
[Posted in FML issue 4484]