Detailed information on the subject of keeping pets in a rental apartment
Essentially, your rental agreement will tell you if you can keep pets in your rental apartment. Under current law, landlords can include a provision in the rental agreement banning tenants from keeping all animals or only certain animals such as dogs and cats in the rental property (however, small animals such as ornamental fish, cage birds, turtles, and hamsters cannot be banned).
If a tenant ignores an explicit ban, they must accept that this gives their landlord the extraordinary right to terminate the tenancy due to violation of the rental agreement. For the most part, rental agreements do not ban the keeping of pets, instead making this dependent on the express agreement of the landlord. Consent can only be refused if the landlord has an important reason to do so (e.g. an animal allergy of the neighbor, if there is a specific nuisance or risk due to the pet, or if it is not possible to keep pets because of limited space). Even tacit, years’ long tolerance of pets by the landlord may not necessarily be construed as agreement. For this reason, it is recommended for the pet owner to have the consent of the landlord confirmed in writing. Our sample request to your landlord can help you.
If the landlord has granted their approval to the keeping of pets, this may only be revoked in exceptional cases. If the dog constantly barks, or stinks, or is a proven nuisance to the neighbors, the landlord can revoke approval within the scope of keeping their duty of care if the nuisance fails to improve.