Honestly, if you have insurance to cover what's in that room, I would claim all electronics as a loss because you don't know what the effects will be .

I don't think we have renters insurance, but it sounds like the ceiling wasn't built to code, and my wife could have been seriously injured or killed (the ceiling scraped her wrist as she ran out), so they are supposed to be taking care of us. Wasn't real sure what was reasonable to ask of them.

As a landlord, as a general statement, my insurance does not cover your personal property. You are responsible to carry renters insurance to cover your property loss. So your claim for property loss may or may not be successful. What does your lease say about it? Does it say you are responsible to carry renters insurance for personal property? If it does then you will have less success in your claim.

That's good advice, thank you.

But if the roof almost came down on my wife and it was due to the apartments not being built correctly, you're saying they would wash their hands of responsibility if I don't have renter's insurance?

They don’t have to pay for your stuff because it almost (but didn’t actually) injure your wife. Close only counts in horse shoes.... it’s fine to ask them to pay for everything but be prepared for a refusal based on lack of renters insurance. But no harm asking, you might get at least something.

mainenell is correct. Landlords are not responsible for your personal property unless it is specified in your rental contract he is . I am highly sure it isn't in your rental contract. It usually isn't. You need renters insurance to cover your personal property. Even if your wife was injured she isn't considered property and that would be a different ball game.

Think about it as if there was a fire. Your stuff wouldn't be covered under the landlords property. Although you did notify that there was a problem and they even acknowledged that there was a problem.

I guess it is kind of their fault to an extent. Another analogy : If next door neighbor has a tree that is dying and large limb is hanging over your garage. You send a letter to neighbors advising about this dangerous situation. They are now officially been notified that there is a potential hazard and could be liable for damages if limb fell on your property. Although if it just fell because of a bad storm on your garage and tree had no known issues before that then neighbors would not be liable.

Thank you. That's helpful. Fortunately because the ceiling was not constructed correctly and they didn't get back to us in time to take care of it before it fell, they are going replace anything non-salvagable. Thank you everyone for taking the time to give me input and advice.

Yeah!!! By the way, OMG, what a mess. Are going to have to sift the that mess looking for small items like jewelry. Hopefully you did have too much stuff laying about. Is it even safe to do that..... Wear face mask, long sleeves and gloves. I would think they are going to clean it up but it would really bother me cause I have a lot of precious stuff in my bedroom to keep from little kids hands.

I understand the reasoning of those who say nothing is covered but landlords have to assume responsibility for properties being safe and up to code. I'd tell them that they don't have to pay for your belongings and you don't have to stay off social media. Sorry, this is a huge failure of building quality, one that brings legal liability to the builder and the property owner. The building inspections office in your town might also be interested in what happened.

Think about other people in this town home development. Could it happen to them, too? Next time, will someone be hurt or killed?

@Izzy Mn fortunately they sent a cleaning crew to take care of it. Most of our more expensive and irreplaceable stuff was in a different room, or safely in the closets.

They set us up with an air mattress to sleep downstairs so we didn't have to go to a hotel, because we didn't want to leave our pets and felt more secure being there while they cleaned and repaired the place.

We're waiting for the paint of the new ceiling to dry, then we'll be doing the tedious job of sifting through belongings they put in plastic bags as they cleaned. They are going to either replace our stuff or cut a check, perhaps a bit of both depending on the items. We're giving them a chance to make things right since we've been loyal tenants for over 5yrs.

I'm glad they're working with you. In my estimation, the worst thing a business can do after something like this is to refuse to pay for anything. Spending a bit of money to make your tenants (read customers who give you money every month, on time and in full) safe and happy is much cheaper than dealing with the fallout when something like this gets publicized. However, you see people taking the short view, messing themselves up in the long run, all the time.

@Carolina Kitchen & Bath, that's kind of how we felt. We didn't sign an agreement to live in an apartment not built to safety regulations. So long as we feel like we are taken care of, we are going to chalk it up to a mistake since no one was seriously injured. They are having inspectors go around to all the apartments to make sure none of the others are safety hazards. We haven't been in the room since they painted, but here is a photo of it with the new paneling in.

What was it that wasn't up to code? And did they correct it or just put the drywall back up and hope that it'll last another 10 years before falling down again?

How old is this building?

10-15 yrs ago was when they had the buildings remodeled or something of the sort. It sounds like they were holding the ceiling up with nails not screws and so they wiggled out over time. They also dragged their feet getting back to us when we initially pointed out the ceiling cracks and it possibly could have been prevented or at least better prepared for repairs where we could have got our stuff out first.

Possibly older building practices. They used to nail drywall. Now the use screws. I know my parents house has had a few nail pops on a few walls, why there are none on the ceiling I don't know. Possibly nails finally gave up. Maybe they just need to reinforced using screws in the ceiling of other rooms/apartments to secure ceiling drywall.

I believe it wasn't a mistake and certainly not planned for or expected. One explanation is that the insulation got wet and the ceiling fell in. You say there was a closed off attic access. Is it possible that the airflow above the ceiling got constricted and moisture built up? I had a friend who was living in his one year old house when he walked through the front hall and the floor collapsed, putting him in the crawl space. Builder hadn't put in foundation vents and the moisture rotted the subfloor. My point is that any of these conditions are certainly not the fault of the tenant and the loss should not be theirs.

Probably the biggest problem was that we told them about it and no one took care of the problem before it became a huge problem.

I have had a very similar incident occurred to when I was renting. Although a little different, I did benefit from the fact that the rental company was non compliant, so thought I should share.
We had a fire breakout in the kitchen in the middle of the night(3am). Although, we woke up in time to move out and call the fire Dept; we lost a bunch of stuff in the kitchen.
The rental company, was very uptight on the whole situation and blamed us for everything - although we had reported an issue with one of the electrical burners that would work one day, and not the other(they did nothing for me than 2 weeks).
Long story short, when I brought my lawyer friend into the equation; they noticed that there we no fire/smoke alarms installed in the bedroom and many of the ones in the building were non functional. That seriously changed the whole ball game, and we were offered compensation for the stuff we lost in the fire, a week's hotel and food bill and best of all the building manger's arrogance was nowhere to be seen for the next year or so we lived there.

just a thought - even if not a lawyer, I might see if the attorney general's office in your state or your town office can offer any pointers on your rights.
I would also go to www.usa.gov/housing-complaints and find out what resources you have to understanding your rights. there's a ton of good material there.

But do look into purchasing renter's insurance. It's a good hedge against the things that you just can't predict.

I'm glad it all worked out, but renter's insurance is a MUST!