So my wife 18 month old daughter and I live in an apartment building with 6 units all connected by a single hallway in Pennsylvania. A few weeks ago we had the issue of fecal matter coming back up threw our shower drain. A short while after there has been a very strong nauseating smell of sewage in the apartment hallway, our bathroom and the closet in our apartment. Both of which have a wall that it shares with the outside hallway.

We have had issues before with the property management not taking care of the property to the point I had to call the city on multiple occasions due to my texts about the dumpster over flowing into parking spacing and making it almost impossible to leave the parking lot without running over trash being ignored.

To get back on track I reach out to them on Sunday about the issue and was told they would be out tomorrow(Monday) to check. I have text them every day since asking about an update and the response is that they are waiting for a machine to become available because it is a big job. It has now been three days they are waiting on the machine and tomorrow something may get done about it according to the property manager. We don’t have a place to go so we are subject to the smell of an entire apartment complex sewage for 5 days because they are trying to save a dollar using the buildings maintenance man.

After the wall of text I guess I’m asking what my next legal action is. All laws pretty much state that the insufficient sewage makes it uninhabitable. I understand that I can withhold my rent in that case I just don’t know how to go about that properly. Or if I have any other options. I already have a money order dated for today the first of July.