LAS VEGAS, Nev. (FOX5) – FOX5 is looking into Nevada law and your rights and options if you’re renting and your A/C goes out.
FOX5 heard from a woman named “Kim” who had trouble with her A/C since she moved in, back in April. She said her A/C did not work very well or at all, and showed FOX5 screen grabs of temperatures inside soaring to 97 degrees with the thermostat set at 74 degrees.
She tells FOX5 that property management with Cape Cod apartments did repeatedly send out a maintenance worker, but the string of repairs did not help. She said the maintenance worker told her to set the temperature to 74 degrees, with not much success to lowering the inside temperature.
“I guess we had a heat wave. And then we winded up having extremely high [temperatures] in here,” Kim said to FOX5. She ended up calling the newsroom to ask for help and any relief.
By the time FOX5 called Kim back, she reported that her A/C unit was completely replaced. She faced a different problem: her NV Energy bill soared to $700 for two months, and Kim worries that her broken A/C and thermostat set to 74 degrees led to the high bill.
FOX5 reached out to her management company to ask if and how they could assist with the bill; a representative with the company responded to our email, stating that the matter was a private matter between the tenant and management.
FOX5 turned to Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada for help. Your A/C is considered an “essential service” under state law, and your landlord must provide that service and repairs.
“We see it here almost every single day. We’ll also see at the Civil Law Self Help Center. What are my rights? What do I have to do?” said consumer rights attorney Harrison Bohn.
Bohn walks us through the steps you can and should take.
1) Send your landlord a notice. You must give a written notice, keep a copy and document how and when you sent it, via email, text or certified mail. You can use a copy from the Civil Law Self-Center’s sample letter. “You need to have that paper trail, especially if you get in front of a judge,” Bohn said.
2) Wait. You must give your landlord 48 hours, not including holidays or weekends, for them to respond and fix the problem.
3) Enforce your rights if the landlord does not repair your unit. You can exercise options that include:
º Paying for repairs, and deducting the amount from your rent.
º Getting a hotel or another option to stay. “Try and find something that’s very comparable to your rent, but also communicate all these costs to your landlord the entire time,” Bohn said.
º If repairs are not made, withhold your rent until the landlord has attempted to restore essential services.
If you withhold rent, you may run into a scenario where your landlord pursues an eviction. According to the Civil Law Self Help Center, respond to any notices from the court.
If you withheld rent, you must pay it to the court. “That’s showing the judge that ‘it’s never been about the money I can pay. I just want to live in somewhere that’s habitable,” Bohn said.
For a guide of what to do in these scenarios, click here: Essential Services and Your Rent
Copyright 2024 KVVU. All rights reserved.
A recent Review-Journal letter to the editor mischaracterized Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto’s Southern Nevada Economic Development and Conservation Act, also known as the Clark County Lands bill. As the former executive director of the Nevada Conservation League, I wholeheartedly support this legislation, so I wanted to set the record straight.
Sen. Cortez Masto has been working on this bill for years in partnership with state and local governments, conservation groups like the NCL and local area tribes. It’s true that the Clark County lands bill would open 25,000 acres to help Las Vegas grow responsibly, while setting aside 2 million acres for conservation. It would also help create more affordable housing throughout the valley while ensuring our treasured public spaces can be preserved for generations to come.
What is not correct is that the money from these land sales would go to the federal government’s coffers. In fact, the opposite is true.
The 1998 Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act is a landmark bill that identified specific public land for future sale and created a special account ensuring all land sale revenues would come back to Nevada. In accordance with that law 5 percent of revenue from land transfers goes to the state of Nevada for general education purposes, 10 percent goes to the Southern Nevada Water Authority for needed water infrastructure and 85 percent supports conservation and environmental mitigation projects in Southern Nevada. This legislation has provided billions to Clark County and will continue to benefit generations of Southern Nevadans. Sen. Cortez Masto’s lands bill builds upon the act’s success.
So here’s the good news: All of the money generated from land made available for sale under Sen. Cortez Masto’s bill would be sent to the special account created by the 1998 law. Rather than going to an unaccountable federal government, the proceeds would continue to help kids in Vegas get a better education, bolster outdoor recreation and modernize Southern Nevada’s infrastructure.
I know how important it is that money generated from the sale of public land in Nevada stay in the hands of Nevadans, and so does the senator. That’s why she opposed a Republican effort last year to sell off 200,000 acres of land in Clark County and other areas of the country that would have sent those dollars directly to Washington.
Public land management in Nevada should benefit Nevadans. We should protect sacred cultural sites and beloved recreation spaces, responsibly transfer land for affordable housing when needed and ensure our state has the resources it needs to grow sustainably. I will continue working with Sen. Cortez Masto to advocate for legislation, such as the Clark County lands bill, that puts the needs of Nevadans first.
Paul Selberg writes from Las Vegas.
click to expand photos
Las Vegas High’s baseball team claimed a 3-2 home win over Coronado on Friday.
Las Vegas (9-13-1) next hosts Rancho at 10 a.m. Saturday. Coronado (13-14) hosts Chaparral at 3:30 p.m. Monday.
Contact Alex Wright at awright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlexWright1028 on X.
LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — Nevada’s jobless rate is holding steady, but the state is still adding jobs.
A new report from DETR shows February’s unemployment rate unchanged at 5.3 percent, with the labor force growing by nearly 3,800 people.
MORE ON FOX5: Nevada unemployment rate rises to 5.3% in January
Nevada now has about 1.6 million nonfarm jobs, up 2.2 percent over the past year and 1,500 more jobs than in January.
“This month’s report shows a strengthening labor market,” said David Schmidt, Chief Economist. ”Compared to the report for January, the pace of job gains in the past year increased from 1.9% to 2.2%, building on what was already the fastest pace of job growth in the country. While the unemployment rate remained stable, the labor force participation rate rose to 63.7%, 1.7 percentage points higher than the national level.”
In Las Vegas, employment ticked up by 1,100 jobs in February, about 0.1 percent, and is up more than 25,000 jobs compared to last year.
Reno added 1,000 jobs on the month, while Carson City shed about 200 but is still slightly above where it was a year ago.
Copyright 2026 KVVU. All rights reserved.
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