Housing in Groningen for Students

DO NOT RENT HOUSING IN GRONINGEN FROM HERMAN TARIS

Hello,

  I have set up this website as a warning against my previous landlord.  I have left a comment section at the bottom.  If you have had trouble with Herman Taris or any other landlord in Groningen, please post.  

Herman Taris owns many buildings in Groningen.  He keeps them in very bad condition.  I do not know a single person who has gotten a security deposit back from him.  Here are some of my complaints about Herman Taris.

WATER COMPLAINTS

1)  Leaking sewage pump.  Yep.  That means that you may wake up one day to find shit on your floor.  Taris pretended not to understand the problem.   When I left, he told me, "You are shit!" after I mentioned it.

2)  Floods that ruin your belongings.  He may try to officially blame you for flood damage if you try to get your deposit back, even if he has earlier admitted that the flood was due to a problem with the building as a whole  (in my case, a burst pipe in the ceiling).

3)  Drains that do not work unless water decides to flow uphill.  The rental agreement will say that the renter is responsible for the drains...which is reasonable if the drains are built properly.  They are not.  It is physically impossible to clean and dry these drains.

MONEY COMPLAINTS

1)  No one I know has ever gotten a security deposit back from Herman Taris.  Even if you clean very well and fix problems that it was his obligation to fix, he will find an excuse not to give it to you.

2) Rental agreement has shady wording.  If you are Dutch, this may not be much of a problem for you:  You know how the system works, and you can always communicate with people in the government if need be.  As a foreign student, this can be a huge problem, particularly if you have no internet to do research.

3)  He will try to get you to sign things in Dutch.  Unless you are fluent, demand English.  Don't accept that he can't do this.

OTHER COMPLAINTS

1)  Internet is supposedly included.  It is not.  There was a network at my house but it only worked once or twice a week for a few hours at a time.

2)  No lights on the steep stairs

3)  One garbage card for 25 students.

4)  If he has a key to your room, he will sometimes enter without knocking.  To my knowledge, only girls have had this problem.

5)  Personally, I found it difficult to believe he was as bad as other people had told me.  If you have met Taris but never rented from him, you may think he seems friendly and a bit doddering.  He has a nice, English-fluent friend who will assure you that he is a good, honorable man.  This is an act.  On my last day, Taris practically spit in my face before I had said a single word to him.  I knew he might find an excuse to not give me my deposit.  In fact, I could have accepted a reduced deposit if he had behaved reasonably.  He did not.  I was totally unprepared for the personal hatred he showed me.  I don't remember the last time someone said "You are shit!" to me,  and I hardly think it was an appropriate response to a legitimate complaint about his maintenance of the house.  Taris is a two-faced snake.

IF YOU ARE ALREADY RENTING FROM HERMAN TARIS:

1)  Get  half your security deposit back ahead of time.  I did this by threatening not to clean at all and to tell prospective tenants about the problems with the house. (I tried to get the prospective tenants alone to tell them anyway, but didn't always succeed,  I'm so sorry if you wound up with this creep because I kept my mouth shut in front of him. )

2)  Don't ever try to deal with his wife.  She is openly nasty.  Herman Taris will try to act friendly and reasonable until the day you leave so that you will fix and clean things for him (things that are actually his responsibility).  He will sometimes make concessions in order to maintain this act.  Use it.

3)  Register all your complaints with the Housing Office.  They may not be able to help you, but your complaints may be useful to future tenants.  For example, if a previous tenant has complained about the pump, he cannot blame the new tenant for the pump-problems.

4)  Look carefully at your rental agreement.  In mine, only about 60% of my monthly payment was actually rent.  The rest was "advance on future obligations", and I don't believe this referred to utilities.  I have a strong suspicion that the rent is worded this way to cheat the Dutch tax authorities.  I am not sure what to do with this suspicion, but it may be useful to someone else.

STUDENT HOUSING GRONINGEN:  HERMAN TARIS IS A CROOK

GRONINGEN STUDENT HOUSING

Some things to do and not to do:

1) DO get the contact information of other renters when you go to see the apartment.  They may have things to say that they will not say in front of the landlord because they are afraid they will not get their security deposit back.

2) DO ask about internet reliability, drains, and whether there is a spare garbage card.

3) DO get pictures of any badly-constructed parts of the house as soon as they give you problems.

4) DO ask the Housing Office what sorts of complaints this landlord has had, and report all your own complaints.

5) DO NOT expect the Housing Office to be useful in resolving these complaints.  They are basically an advertising agency and they have very little power.

6) DO NOT ever make a verbal agreement with a landlord, even if he seems reasonable and has honored verbal agreements in the past.  Get all agreements in writing, in English if that is your preference.  You should also get any admissions of fault in writing For instance, if a flood damages your room and it is not your fault, get a written statement by the landlord to that effect.

7) If possible, get part of your security deposit back before you leave.  It is best to stay with a friend on your last day in the country.  Your landlord knows that your plane ticket cost more than your deposit.  If you have an appointment with him on your very last day, he may choose to be late to avoid paying you.

8)  DO NOT pay for cleaning of the apartment until after you have moved out.  DO NOT agree to put down a separate deposit for cleaning.