[Lindengardens] Washing Machine Next to Door Will Be Fixed Next Week

Candy Malina candyjoy at earthlink.net
Wed Jun 23 00:17:11 EDT 2010 

Actually, I believe the laundry contract goes until July, 2011, so it 
is another year.  And about breaking the contract early -- I had a 
couple of attorneys tell me early on that we could likely break it, 
because it was actually a contract that Dan Silva, as Broadway 
Management (owner of the machines) made with himself, Dan Silva as 
Linden Ave. Associates, which was the name of the entity that 
officially owned the building prior to it being condo-ized.  The 
contract says that Linden Ave. Associates and successors (i.e, Linden 
Gate Condo) are responsible for that contract until July, 2011.  I 
was told by one attorney that it is illegal to bind successors on a 
service contract, which that attorney thought the laundry contract 
would be considered, and also I was told that "self-dealing" is 
illegal, especially if it is not in the best interest of one of the 
two parties -- the attorney who told me that was of the opinion that 
signing a 10 year contract was not in the best interest of Linden 
Ave. Associates.  HOWEVER -- our current attorney, who is one of the 
top condo attorneys in Massachusetts, told met that the 10-year 
contract for laundry machines is standard, and also told me that 
these contracts are very hard to break.  I guess the bad outcome 
would be that he sues us for breach of contract, and that we might 
then need to pay him for the remainder of the contract, meaning all 
the income he would potentially have generated from the machines -- 
plus court and attorney fees.  So we had decided it wasn't worth the 
risk of that, as I recall.  We talked about trying to have a 
conversation with him and seeing if we could work out a compromise 
amicably, but my sense from Dick William's initial conversation with 
him, in which he was reportedly furious about our breaking the 
contract at all, was that he wouldn't likely compromise.

If he doesn't keep up the machines, then I would guess he is 
breaching the contract, which I assume says that they are kept in 
good working order (I am sure I have a copy of it somewhere: I assume 
the current trustees do too; I know Paradigm does).  However, if we 
don't inform him of the machines not working, then we can't accuse 
him of breaching the contract by not fixing them.  (If he breaches 
the contract, then we could theoretically get out of it.)  I imagine 
that this would be his motivation for fixing them in a timely 
manner.  Otherwise -- our current attorney had advised us to send the 
letter breaking the contract as early as possible, because you have 
to put your intention to break it in writing 180 days (6 MONTHS!) 
before it ends, or it rolls over automatically for ANOTHER TEN 
YEARS!!  Seriously.  So she said that we were better off making sure 
he got the letter way ahead of time.  Which I think made sense -- 
however, I wonder what that does to his motivation for maintaining 
the machines?

All this being said (I'm sure way more information than you wanted!) 
-- I agree with Chris.  The deal is that he gets to keep the machines 
here AND collects 2/3 of the income from them, and that in return, he 
keeps them in good working order.  I don't see why we would want to 
limp along with machines that don't work well; I don't believe there 
is anything in the contract that would require us to do so.  In fact, 
I would look at the wording of the contract.  It might be that he 
needs to replace the machines if they are not working adequately.

My way-more-than-2-cents!

Candy

At 11:47 PM 6/22/2010, you wrote:
>I sympathize with Chris and others who get frustrated by the wall 
>machine, but the fact is, it's still working. And Charlie's reboot 
>procedure does work, when the machine gets stuck at the end of a 
>cycle (after it's been opened before the "wait" sign flashes off).
>
>Trouble is, some of us have gotten used to these idiosyncracies, but 
>new tenants won't know, and their landlords shouldn't have to give 
>them a complicated explanation.  So I suggest we put up a brief sign 
>above the machine explaining the way it works. It will only be for 
>another six months or so, at most.
>
>Indeed, I wonder if we shouldn't tell Sylva that we are going to 
>replace his machines in the last quarter of this year, rather than 
>waiting until 2011. What could he really do about it? Anyway, if we 
>wrote the letter to him saying we intend to do so, it would be 
>interesting to see how he responds!
>
>mmm
>
>Martin M. Marks
>Senior Lecturer
>MIT, Music and Theater Arts Section, 10-268
>77 Massachusetts Ave.
>Cambridge MA, 02139
>
>Office phone: 617-253-4967
>Mobile phone: 617-851-8955
>Email: <mailto:mmmarks at mit.edu>mmmarks at mit.edu
>
>
>
>
>
>On Jun 22, 2010, at 11:28 PM, Charlie Denison wrote:
>
>>Sure I'll make sure he looks at this machine as well. If it's any 
>>consolation, when I've called his company with washing machine 
>>problems before (I called the number posted on the sign in the 
>>laundry room), they have always been quick to respond. I personally 
>>have never had issues with the machine by the wall, but clearly 
>>there is a problem with it. The trustees will make sure the 
>>machines are in working order until our contract is done in 2011.
>>
>>Charlie
>>
>>Chris De Angelis wrote:
>>>Charlie, thanks for the experiment and feedback.  But I have to 
>>>ask: are we just going to live with the unreliability of this 
>>>machine until we can replace it?
>>>
>>>I am going to be renting my unit soon, and I would really prefer 
>>>that Mr. Silva take the time and spend what he needs to fix both 
>>>machines, since he has stuck us with them until 2011, rather than 
>>>have to explain to my renter "to get that machine near the wall 
>>>working, stand on your head, do the hokie pokey five times, and 
>>>insert your money, and it may then start".  He is getting the 
>>>majority of the money we spend on our laundry, and I feel he has 
>>>given us a very unsatisfactory level of maintenance over the years 
>>>after sticking the condominium association with this contract 
>>>going back six or seven years that says we have to use his machines until 2011.
>>>
>>>Giving him the benefit of the doubt, if we make him understand 
>>>that this machine sometimes says "WAIT" with no explanation of 
>>>what's wrong or how to mend it, maybe he'll do what's necessary to 
>>>fix it.  Could we please do that and avoid the potential for 
>>>putting an extra couple of bucks in his pocket because his 
>>>machines aren't reliable?
>>>
>>>Respectfully,
>>>Chris
>>>
>>>----- Original Message -----
>>>From: "Charlie Denison" <mailto:cdenison at comcast.net><cdenison at comcast.net>
>>>To: <mailto:lindengardens at mit.edu>lindengardens at mit.edu
>>>Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 2010 9:16:56 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern
>>>Subject: Re: [Lindengardens] Washing Machine Next to Door Will Be 
>>>Fixed Next Week
>>>
>>>OK it seems to be okay now. I put the lid down, but that didn't do 
>>>anything. Then while he lid was still down, I unplugged the 
>>>machine and plugged it back in. The computer made some noises for 
>>>about 10 seconds, then said THANK YOU. It's ready for a new load 
>>>now and says INSERT $2.00.
>>>
>>>Charlie
>>>
>>>Chris De Angelis wrote:
>>>So tonight, the washing machine next to the wall is just reading 
>>>"WAIT" on the display and is not doing anything.  I came down to 
>>>the laundry room and found it like that; it's empty and the lid is 
>>>open, but I'm not willing to risk having it eat another $2.
>>>
>>>Can we get that machine looked at tomorrow also?  I'm afraid while 
>>>some of the time it is true that it just takes a while to start, 
>>>we are having bad luck with it in that it sometimes eats our 
>>>credit, tells us to wait, and then never starts.
>>>
>>>Thanks -
>>>Chris
>>>
>>>----- Original Message -----
>>>From: "Aaron Federman" <mailto:aafedz at yahoo.com><aafedz at yahoo.com>
>>>To: <mailto:lindencondos at yahoogroups.com>lindencondos at yahoogroups.com
>>>Cc: <mailto:lindengardens at mit.edu>lindengardens at mit.edu
>>>Sent: Saturday, June 19, 2010 12:57:14 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern
>>>Subject: [Lindengardens] Washing Machine Next to Door Will Be 
>>>Fixed Next Week
>>>
>>>Dan Silva stopped by the building to look at the laundry machine. 
>>>The washing machine closest to the door is filling and draining 
>>>correctly, but the water is not "agitating" properly. He will send 
>>>a repair person on Wednesday to fix the washing machine closest to 
>>>the door. I told him to wait until Wednesday since we have 
>>>plumbing work being done on Tuesday in our boiler room that will 
>>>require us to shut off the water pressure. The washing machine 
>>>closest to the wall still works correctly. It just takes several 
>>>minutes to start. Dan may try to replace the card reader in that 
>>>machine, but he doesn't know if that will make it start any faster. Aaron
>>>_______________________________________________ Lindengardens 
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