Is a landlord entitled to rent once the apartment is vacated and the lease ended?
May 18th, 2011 | 
Author: My lease ended 12/01/04, rent was paid for that month I vacated on 12/27/04.
The landlord did not review the apartment until 1/27/05 I was billed for lost rent for January and February. I was advised he was entitled to my security deposit which covered all “damages” as well as a nonrefundable pet deposit I paid.
When I informed the landlord to speak with my attorney I had photos showing a clean apartment the matter dropped.
Now -four years later I receive a bill from a collection agency-He even added my security deposit as a charge instead of subtracting it. It shows twice as positive balance and a charge.
This is insane!
Yes. I gave notice. I was told I had to vacate by the end of the month because the lease had expired, and I was not going to renew. December rent was paid.
I had been struck by a car and the landlord knew that I was involved in a law suit. I had children and it was Christmas. I asked to be allowed to stay until the 30th – I was told I was to be out by 26th. He relented and gave me until the 28th.
Posted in Landlord Tenant Law
If your lease ended and you did not sign a new one, then you should not be responsible for any more money. I would dispute this. Make some phone calls. Call your ex-landlord and talk to him about this. Unless your lease stated that you were financially responsible until it was rented out again, you should not have to pay. I would also call the collection agency to see how you can dispute this with them. Good Luck.
Ok, here’s my simple non lawyer advice. Do not write to or talk to the creditor, the bill collector, or anyone else on this matter. Once you acknowledge this is your debt by talking to them the 7 year window extends from the date you talk to them. So they have 7 years from 2/1/04 to collect which is 2/1/11, but if you talk to them it’s more like 4/8/16. You can just ignore them and this will go away.
Your landlorde sold them that because they give him money for it. He got paid to lie. The more you talk to these folks you wil realize they don’t give a damn about the truth just about getting money from you through intimdation and coercion.
Even if you mail them a copy of your deposit and the letters and everything they will simply sell the debt to another company, and so forth, and so on. I had a debt that wans’t legitimate cleared and sold about 1/2 dozen times till I stopped answering the phone and talking to them about it. I guess they figure if they badger you they can get more money.
You may also be worried about this because you are concerned about your credit score being affected. That’s a legitimate concern, and your landlord may have had and sold them your SSN. So in that case same advice as above with one addition, go ahead an pull your credit score, every six months or so (maybe more or less depending on you) and look to see who claims you have late payment.
The laws are very strict on what is considered required to post a late payment. The poster must have documentation sepcific to the law, and often they do not. If you do not dispute the posting then it’s consideered legitimate, but if you dispute the posting then the creditor has to prove that they (the creditor) meet the letter of the law. You can do this by hiring a credit repair company (get a referral from a friend) who will help you by doing the papers. My brother has much worst credit record than me but hire a credit repair company which brough his score into the 700′s from the 500′s. Normally you only need to worry about this about 3-6 months before buying a home or a maybe a car.
In answer to your headline: no.
It sounds like you’ve done the right things. I would suggest either calling the landlord or having an attorney call. Clearly the security deposit thing is a mistake that they should correct.
Did you give 60 days written notice to vacate?
How can a nonrefundable pet deposit be returned to you?
A security deposit NEVER covers ALL damages.
Did you get a move out report?
You can be charged for rent if you failed to give notice.
Photos taken by tenants never show the damage they have done, they are helpful, but do not mean that much.
However, you can dispute this collection, he is not supposed to send anything to collections without a judgment first. The idiot collection agency should have requested a copy of the court order.
With no judgment they have to remove this.
Send copy of everything to collection agency. State that this collection is in error, a mistake, that the issue was resolved in 2005. Send letter to LL also, demanding that he advise collection agency of error..
Did you give proper 30 days notice? You cannot just leave when your lease is up, you still must give notice.
If you did not give proper notice then they can legally keep your deposit. They can also legally charge you for January rent because of the lack of notice. They cannot charge you rent past January though.
How clean the unit was is immaterial when they keep the deposit for notice issues.
It sounds like he decided you were being unreasonable and just sent it to collections. He legally needed to send an accounting to you first though. For the collections to be legal he has to have proof he tried to send it to you.
EDIT: They cannot force you to leave before the end of your notice. That was illegal. Fight them in court. They have done many things wrong!
You can contest this but you will probably have to go to court to do so. Simply inform the collection agency in writing that you dispute the charges and will not pay them and do not wish to be contacted by them. The next document they send you will probably be a court summons. Then you can go and make your case to the judge.
4 YRS LATER….WHEN DID HE GET A JUDGEMENT? MOST STATES HE ONLY HAS A YR TO FILE, THINK ID FINE THIS OUT FIRST, IF HE EVEN GOT ONE, AND WHEN……………..