Purdue tenant believes Neil Armstrong's old house is unsafe

Ron Wilkins | Journal & Courier

WEST LAFAYETTE — Cassidy Girouard moved into 400 N. Salisbury St. at the end of July, but she's never stayed a night in the house.

“When we came in, (Sugarhill Prosperites) said, ‘We’re going to fix everything. Don’t worry. It’s going to be great,’" Girouard said, noting her initial take on the house built in 1910 was that it needed work. “I’m naïve. I didn’t know they wouldn’t do anything."

The front of the house still remains overgrown with weeds, which Girouard said Sugarhill Properties promised to clean up. It's the same clump of weeds that cluttered the house a year ago when three previous tenants moved out because of health and safety concerns.

The house, which Neil Armstrong once rented while a student at Purdue, sat vacant from September 2018 until August, said Dale Dixon, director of West Lafayette's Rental Housing Authority, which inspects rentals for safety and issues certificates of occupancy.

“If I had more knowledge about things like this, obviously," Girouard said, "I wouldn’t have signed this lease, but I believed them.”

She's fortunate in that her grandparents live in the area, so she's been staying with them while she works and attends classes during her junior year at Purdue.

The Saturday she moved her things into the house, she noticed the ceiling in the dining room was water stained and sagging.

“The next day the ceiling fell down … from the leaking in the bathroom,” she said.

She said Sugarhill Properties repaired it, but where the hole was is still visible, she said.

A 20-page privately funded home inspection performed Oct. 7 by Don Chambers of Inspections Unlimited gives credibility to her complaints. The report mostly rated the house as unsatisfactory and noted several health and safety issues, including rotted wood, exposed asbestos and leaks in the second-floor bathroom plumbing that is damaging the first-floor ceilings.

One such notation is that water from the second-story toilet leaks from the pipe and into the wall, staining the plaster. The leak trickles down the pipes to the basement.

The water's path crosses two electrical boxes, according to the home inspection, which Girouard provided to the West Lafayette Rental Housing Authority and to the property's owner, Sugarhill Properties.

"The waste water leakage from the second floor to the basement/cellar needs to have the walls fully opened, leak corrected and all surface areas properly disinfected; NOW!" the report states.

“I don’t believe that is true,” Gary Lane, president of Sugarhill Properties, said Thursday when the Journal & Courier called him for comment.

Girouard took photos and videos of the leaks. The photos are included in the privately funded report.

basementwater_leaking Report states that the second-floor toilet at 400 N. Salisbury St., West Lafayette leaks into the walls and the basement, crossing 2 electrical boxes.

She also has video of the water-soaked plaster walls, including around the dining room light switch.

“When we turned it on, the light fixture was crackling. So we decided not to turn it on,” Girouard said of the light switch in the path of the water soaked plaster. “We told the landlord, and they replaced the light fixture, but didn’t do anything about the water in the wall.”

She also has video of the dining room lights pulsing while an electrical arching crackle is heard on the video.

Dining room light crackles and pulses when switch is turned on. Turning on the dining room light caused what appears to be an electrical arch that can be seen and heard in this video.

If there's a problem, Lane said, all the tenant has to do is contact them, and they'll repair it.

One Girouard's video shows the repair of water damaged plaster in the stairwell below the second-floor bathroom. Even after the repairs, water seeps from the stained, blistered and bubbling plaster, including over and around the light switch.

Bathroom leak damages plaster, crosses electrical boxes, report says Leaks from the bathroom damages the plaster walls as it seeps to the basement, where the water crosses two electrical boxes, according to report.

The Inspections Unlimited report also noted that there are 30-amp fuses on wiring that is rated for less than 30 amps. Additionally, there were 60-amp fuses on wires rated for only 30 amps.

Chambers would not comment on the specific report because Girouard's mother, who is the client, had not authorized him to speak to the specifics.

Asked, however, of the dangers of fuses that don't shut down wiring carrying more amps than the lines can handle, Chambers said this would cause hot spots in places along the lines if there is too much electricity being drawn. That could spark a fire.

Chambers' home inspection also found that ground wires leading to the basement hanged from the cellar's ceiling, not attached to anything. So none of the three-pronged outlets are grounded. That also means the house's ground-fault interrupters in bathrooms and the kitchen will not work, according to the report.

Girouard complained to the West Lafayette Rental Housing Authority, and Dixon said they inspected the house on Aug. 20 based on Girouard's complaint, including that the windows didn't open.

They inspected 400 N. Salisbury St. again on Aug. 27 and found that the three complaints Girouard filed had been fixed, Dixon said.

But the Oct. 7 home inspection that Girouard's parents paid for indicated a laundry list of problems, including that not all of the windows opened.

Yet 400 N. Salisbury St. still has the city's rental authorities approval for occupancy.

“I’m gong to deal with it with my tenants," Lane said during a brief interview with the Journal & Courier. "This is not really for you.

“Every inspector that works for the city has been to that house, and it has passed. Good-bye.”

Inspectors were in and out of the house last fall when three Purdue students — Kristen Hecht, Jacob Ward and Caylie Jones — complained about unhealthy and unsafe conditions in the house. While inspectors noted improvements, their reports still had a list of recommendations.

More: A cautionary tale: Look before you lease off campus housing

More than a year after the Sept, 27, 2018, inspection, many of the issues cited in that report have not been repaired, based on the private inspection on Oct. 7, 2019.

Even from the sidewalk, it is clear that the Sept. 27, 2018, inspection mandate to fix the eastside storm door so it latches has not been completed.

Dixon said he told Girouard the privately funded home inspection might be useful in her efforts to get out of her lease.

But is it enough to go in and inspect for the electrical and fire hazards documented in the report?

“It’s enough to get back onto the property and look at these things,” he said Wednesday, noting they'll take a look at the electrical issues cited in the privately funded home inspection.

“I feel really stupid, to be honest," Girouard said Thursday standing outside the house for an interview with the J&C. "I feel pretty played. I haven’t even lived here, and they’ve taken over $2,000.”

The two girls whom Girouard planned to room with in the house appear to still be there, but Girouard said they have friends a couple doors down and stay there.

Girouard, who isn't comfortable with confrontation, said her former roommates don't want to rock the boat, either, and fighting the lease might leave them worse off if they contested the house's conditions.

Girouard rattled off other health hazards she saw such as mold, clearly discolored plaster on ceilings indicating a leaking roof, as well as doors jambs that are damaged.

The Journal & Courier knocked on the house's doors attempting to speak with the women who live there. No one answered the door.

Reach Ron Wilkins at 765-420-5231 or at rwilkins@jconline.com. Follow on Twitter: @RonWilkins2.

More news at the Journal & Courier:

Lafayette nurse celebrates birthday honoring her dad, offering one free coffee at a time

4-year-old boy hit by truck during trick-or-treating

West Lafayette girls carry on tradition into cross country state finals