I have a small claims case and I am seeking advice for my case I processed against my former roommate. She is disputing the claim and I was wanting legal advice regarding her letter she sent me regarding the summons she received from me.
She failed to pay rent and utilities when we had agreed to pay half of rent and utilities. She was forced to be removed off the lease voluntarily in order to avoid eviction from Landlord and I was granted to stay in property because I was paying rent and she was not. She claims to have been current on all rent and bills when she left property and lease agreement. That is incorrect, this is why she had to leave. I have all documentation to prove the matter here.
Her letter she sent to me also states she wants my proof of copies of my documentation to prove my claim because she was without any merit when she left she claims. However, I do not want to give her my documentation because it has all my personal information on it. I just told her the court will strictly handle the case and decide the judgment. Was that okay?
Any one know of attorneys who handle these kinds of cases in Cumberland, MD? Or is there a landlord tenant hot line to call?
She also claims in the letter if I had contacted her before filing suit, the matter could have been resolved quickly. This is wrong information from her, this is why I had filed the suit against her because she cut off all communication when she moved out after not paying her half of rent and utilities. This is the first time I have heard from her or get any response from her since August 2009 when it occurred.
Thanks Ranger! She’s just trying to blow a smoke screen and really digging herself a hole. She did not pay rent at all during her stay on the lease.
She will have rights to be shown the documentation at the court date to prove my claim. She had copies of everything when she left. She’s claiming now she does not have anything or got anything. I will send it to her certified mail and she signs it upon delivery each time, then she will say she never got it. . So, now I am not wanting to keep wasting anymore $$ on that.

I’ve been living with my landlord for a bit more than 6 months. At first it seems great because the place is really nice and well decorated and furnitured, the landlord is rarely home, a cleaner come in every week, and two other tenants who live here are great. The house is also in a beautiful semi rural area.
My landlord who is in early or mid 30’s has always been rather shady. No body is sure where he’s from. He isn’t too talkative toward most people, have bunches of suspicious scars, and is rather cold and distant. He always claims he’s a translator for living, but yet we’re in a small city that is almost two hours away from nearest big city. One of the tenants once told me that he used to be in military for a long time and hinted that he have lose someone very close to him in war. They have say if you get past his barrier, he’s actually a very nice, caring, and a great friend that can be rely on.
I am not too fond of my landlord, but I love living here and since landlord was almost never home, I didn’t mind it at all.
On Saturday I and my boyfriend decided to have a party here while the landlord was gone. So we invited about ten people and have some beers and potluck and stuff. When one of the tenants came down, she was extremely upset and shaken by the whole thing and started to cry and begs me to get everyone to leave and clean up. We tried to calm her down, but other tenant came out and we can see he was so scared that he went to get dressed and left the house right away. Since there was so many of us and my boyfriend is really big and have a couple other guys with him, we weren’t too worried. A couple hours later, the landlord came home unexpectedly.
He started by coming to me and told me to get everyone out of the house now. I tried to tell him everything will be ok and we’d not get out of control. He started to get more harsh so my boyfriend came up to him and try to be friendly. Out of blue, he attacked my boyfriend, so everyone tried to stop the fight but couple other people got hurt then my landlord pummeled on my boyfriend for a bit more before he pulls a knife out and hold it by my boyfriend’s eye and warned if everyone didn’t leave, he’d crave his eyes out. That’s when everybody left.
My boyfriend have a fractured sternum, bruised kidney, torn liver, and some damages to face.
I’m living with my mom now and trying to get $800 deposit from my landlord and trying to find an attorney to take on this case because polices classified it as self defense. He was unsympathy at all. He says since my boyfriend threw up on the carpet and everything on the table fell onto the floor, he has to use the moneys to clean the place up.
I can’t believe someone could be such a jerk! What is his issue? We just wanted to have some fun and he did this. Now he’s just making things worse.

I moved out that night without telling him.

I have a situation I am hoping someone can help me with or at least point me in the direction of help. I have a small 401 k plan with the City of NY. I made contributions to it while employed with the city but all contributions stopped once I left my job in 2006. Recently I decided to withdraw $1000.00 and roll the rest over into my new 401 with my new employer. I filled out the necessary paperwork with the city and received a letter stating my request was denied due to a pending domestic order. I called to find out what they were talking about and was told that since I had a “divorce pending” they needed a domestic order to proceed with my application. In 2008 I had made a hardship withdrawal request to avoid eviction. I explained in the letter that I was a victim of domestic violence and financial exploitation at the hands of my husband and was in process of divorcing him. In the interim, my husband and I separated but I did not divorce nor did we legally separate. I have not considered divorcing at this time and have no idea if I will in the future. They explained that I was “flagged” as a result of the letter thus their domestic pending order request. (I never received any correspondence from them in regards to this back in 2008 nor did they every respond to my request for a hardship withdrawal. I am only learning all this now). I have explained that I am not divorced but they said they still need a waiver signed by my husband. I explained that attempting to approach him may put me at risk but they still said I need his signature. Today I received the waiver form in the mail that he is to sign. One of the statements in the waiver they want him to sign says he is acknowledging that he and I are “contemplating the commencement of a divorce or are in the process of a divorce”. This is not the case and I have repeatedly told them this. In addition to having the waiver notarized, they want my husbands phone number ” so he can be contacted” as well as a copy of his ID. I dont understand what they are trying to do. Why have him sign the statement about a divorce that is not happening? The rest of the statements in the waiver are fine and basically says he waives his rights to my money, I can do what I want with it, etc. I do not want them to call him. I feel this is unnecessary and intrusive and worry they could say something that would push him over the edge. I really need some guidance and assurance that the fund is operating within the confines of the law and my rights are protected as well. Thank you in advance for your assistance.
Thank you for the responses. I understand the law as it is written, although I dont agree with it. My issue is the fact that they want me to have my husband sign this waiver which states “{my wife and I} are contemplating the commencement of a divorce or are in the process of a a divorce”. While I did take insignificant steps towards a divorce in 2008 (really just speaking with a lawyer), I never went through with anything and have never filed any paperwork AND my husband is unaware of this.

I’m suing my landlord for breach of contract for about 7k the rent differential for new 1 yr lease in downgraded living conditions not even similar. He told me on move in day he had to breach the contract and never let me move in, I’ve had the lease reviewed there’s no clause relieving him of his contractual responsibilities in the event of a breach he pays damages. My damages being the rent differential a lesser place. I would handle this in small claims court but the max is 3k my suit being for more then that I’ll need an attorney once I have my new lease in place.

So If I’m suing for 7k, would it be 7k plus attorney fees and they don’t take a chunk of my settlement? Or would that 7k include my attorneys fees and they get 1/3 like usual court awards? I know I’ve heard if I win my landlord would have to pay my attorney fees on top of my award or is it built in?
Just to understand my logic, I had a lease in place for a 2br 2bath luxury condo. 1500+ sq ft granite countertops in kitchen and bathroom. All of this for 600 a month Utilities included! This place could have been rented out easily for 1500+ a month. My landlords reasoning for going so cheap was he was moving out of state and didn’t want loose ends. On my move in day with no prior notice he says he has to void the lease because he never got approval from his mortgage company to make his primary residence a rental property. My signed lease was in place for 3 months before move in and he was aware of the situation before signing. He never told me any of this until move in day because he says he was optimistic he could get it resolved. Come move in day he says he couldn’t get it resolved and never made it aware me moving in was contingent on getting his mortgage companies approval to make his primary residence a rental property other then my move in day.
So basically, even to downgrade to a 1br it’s going to cost me about 850 plus utilities. That’s minimally 400 more a month then I would have been paying if the contract had never been breached. To find similar living conditions in my breached lease I would be looking in the 1500+ per month range. Him giving me such a deal and living expectation is coming back to bite him in the arse because I’m entitled to find similar living conditions, in this case similar living conditions cost well over 1,500 per month plus utilities.
Also he’s had my 1st month rent and security for 3 months still haven’t recived them back yet… so even though I didn’t move in… him signing the lease and taking my money, there’s no way for him to get off the hook.
Sure all leases can be broken, broken and you pay damages given it was after the 30 day clause. In my case notice being given on my move in day in an email lol not even through mail… he sends me an email on move in day with my stuff pretty much on his door step.
It wasn’t a scam, he’s a business man and was negligent on informing me on any of this or voiding the lease when time permitted.

He’s lawyered up because he knows he’s wrong and I know for a fact if I take this to small claims he’s brining his hi priced lawyer which he’s not even paying for. While I have the law on my side I feel his lawyers will be more prepared to throw out statutory/case law.
“Or the place was near foreclosure and he was looking for an easy few bucks to tide him over”

That is a possible outcome, but I think he has money. If a lawyer took this wouldn’t I just have to pay for the initial consult then everything after would be included in the award? Not sure why you think it would cost 7k alone in lawyers fees that seems inflated.
I was aware the house was in pre-foreclosure when signed but he assured me it was in the process of being removed because of some modification he was going threw. I told him since I’m in NJ I’m fine with this because I knew my lease was binding regardless of the circumstances in the event he did not give me 30 days notice. Foreclosure was a concern of mine but I called the county sheriffs office and confirmed the ownership was not changing. On my move in day I found out the foreclosure wasn’t the root of my worries, it was him getting approval from his mortgage company. I was not made aware that my move in situation was contingent on getting his mortgage companies approval until my move in day… as I understand that’s my landlords only defense and he has no way to prove that nor written or verbally was that expressed.
My logic for staying with the lease was I knew my lease was binding regardless of the circumstances. I’m in NJ and even if a foreclosure happens the lease is binding so I would still get to move in. So I was fine if foreclosure happened, but on my move in day I found out it had nothing to do with foreclosure but the contingency of him getitng approval to make his primary residence a rental property which never happened.
His logic for not letting me move in was, if he did and the mortgage company found out… he would have to evict me. Since I have a lease in place he couldn’t legally evict me without reason so he would default on his mortgage and lose the house. He admitted he was wrong but basically my interests were lower on the ladder of losing his house. All of this being told to me on move in day no prior notice.

Hello, I hope someone can help. My landlady phoned my husband and I back in July and told us to stop paying rent since she was no longer making payments. Over the next few months we discussed buying the house from her. Then in November she phoned and told us to start paying rent again,which we did immediately. We started applying for a loan and put an offer in a few weeks ago. She was on board with all of this. Then four days ago we found a form taped to our door to “Pay rent or Quit”. We immediately phoned her to ask what was up. She stated she needed to tell the bank why she could not make her payments and was basically using us to do it. She then told us to pay her $8000 or be evicted. We have not had a lease since last July. I explained to her that she told “us” not to pay rent. She then stated she had many debts to pay off and it was too bad for us. We already pay $2200 in rent plus her homeowners dues every month. I told her we had a verbally agreement which was also binding. Then this evening our doorbell rang and we were served eviction papers. Please does anyone know what we can do from here. Thanks so much!!
My written lease ended last July. I started paying the rent to the landlord,not the bank. I applied for a pre-approval loan at a different bank. I have written correspondence from the landlord telling us not to pay rent. Thanks to everyone who is helping me.

I Have been living in my apartment for over 18 years, landlord came and offered me money to move, I decline, went to court won my case the landlord is still trying to evict me, is this legal, I read that the owners can sue you 12 times a year, I don’t have money for an attorney, I went pro per, I can not keep paying filing fees, the owners are harrassing me to move, is this a legal ? not only myself but also my neighbor who also been living here for about 25 years, she also won her eviction case and now they are also taking here back to court.

I have lived her for 5 months now and I have always paid the rent on time. The month before last I noticed it was taking unusually long for the money to be drawn from my account like it usually is after I drop off the check. Next thing I know I have an eviction notice plastered on my door for not paying. I take it to the office immediately and tell them I don’t understand bc I specifically remember dropping this check off. I had been paid early in the month and remember thinking how great it was to pay the bill off early! So I show the manager I have a check missing from my book and that I have the money in my bank account. She has me rewrite a check and says she will “do her best to get the fine waved” um ok thanks.. Two months later I get another notice on my door saying I owe $60 for the late fee. I am not sure what to do about this now. I know I should not have to pay a fine bc the office lost my check but I cannot afford to lose my place over such a petty argument. The only form of proof I think I would have is my bank statement showing I did have the money in my account at the time. What is there that I can do to get this cleared up?

Florida Statutes Title VI, Chapter 83.59 paragraph 3 offers three methods of recovery of the property. Are these choices or are they mandatory legal steps? Must I go through the Clerk of the Court for an eviction process,even though i can declare the property abandoned because of no rent being paid and no return calls when i leave a message?
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