Short and simple I lived in an apartment complex from 6/21/97 â?? 5/31/98 with my ex, the end of the lease was soon to come and I had notified the landlord that I was leaving at the end of the lease but my ex decided to stay in a month-to-month lease, to make a long story short when she left 2months after the yearly lease was up and I had left to live my life there where damages to the apartment totaling around $3500 bucks. These charges where placed on my TRU back in 8/98, so I had contacted the apartment complex about a 4weeks ago to see why I was being charged this damage fee for something that I had nothing to do with, but to my surprise the complex was sold to another management company and any records over 3yrs old were disposed of, and they didnâ??t know who the collection agency was , â?¦.but through a lot of research I found out who the collection agency was and after playing phone tag I finally got through to the CO and he states â??it doesnâ??t matter if you where there or not ,your still responsible since you were on the original leaseâ?. So that leads to my 1st questionâ?¦.am I still responsible. Well I tried to dispute it, but I received the â??dispute verified letter â?? on the 28th, so should I continue to dispute this next, with a validation letter or just give in and work out some payment arrangements, â?¦. I also contacted the management company that used to own the property and they said they do not verify credit disputes with the CRAâ??s and for me to dispute it with the CRAâ??s EFX â?? 552 XPN â?? 506 : (( went down TUC â?? 598
Look, send a validation letter to the collection agency, I am gonna bet you they have no proof. They have to contact the OC to obtain the verification you need. SOoooo if no OC? Then no Verification, then you no owe! Understand? don't complicate things.
But you also said all records over 3 years old have been disposed of, so how could they possibility produce the lease contract?
If you can PROVE you were in another CITY, STATE. or diferent APARTMENT or HOUSE...they will lose in court...so send them a $1,000 LETTER (since you will lose in SMALL CLAIMS COURT, I will save us both the hassle of SMALL CLAIMS COURT...just send me a check for $1,000 and I will go on my marry way)... The ex had a month-to-month...YOU ARE OUT OF IT...
When you say "him" I'm assuming you mean someone from the CA. Anyway, since your lease was terminated (1 year ended), and it went to month to month, did you sign anything when you left saying you were leaving, or that you were no longer responsible for the apartment?
Ok correct me if i'm wrong but didn't you say that you informed the landlord that you would be leaving the premises and that the original lease had expired, then your ex decided to stay on a month to month lease by themselves? If that is the case and the damage occured when you were not living there then I think you'd have a pretty good case>
To answer all questions yes I do have verification that I stayed elswhere and when I refer to "him" I mean the CA ( still new at this posting stuff) ...yeah thats what I thought also, since I informed them that I was leaving, until these lenders started turning me down saying that I'm still obligated to pay them... I read these boards all the time, its just now i'm stuck like a duck in the mud thats why I need all the help I can mustard up...
See, even if you can prove you were not living there, heck even if you were out of state, if you were're discharged of your "duties" to pay on the apartment, which includes keeping it in decent condition, you maybe still be liable. I mean, you could probably make a good case for yourself by arguing that you could not have possibily done the damage since you were far-far away, BUT, this would only work if the landlord inspected the apartment when you left. Did you not get anything from the landlord when you left saying the apartment was in good condition, and that you were no longer on the lease (whether it be 1-yr or month to month)?
no I didnt recieve anything from the apartment manager...basically I did't think I had to since every thing was in good order
(1) Judgement. Do you know if the landlord sued and won a judgement against you? Is the CA collecting a judgement, or just money that the landlord claims you owe. The difference is significant. If there is a judgement, then you have a serious problem. (2) Termination of lease. Normally when a lease period ends the default of a month-to-month kicks in. However, this does not relieve you of your responsibilities as a tenent. Unless you formally vacated the property with an inspection and so on, you are still on the hook. Local laws may vary. You need to find out what your city/state laws say. I would be suprised to find them different. (3) Your Security Deposit. So what happened to your deposit? Didn't you wonder where that went? Did you plan to have the ex keep the deposit? And if so, didn't she wonder where her refund was? Was the deposit withholdings credited against the total damage bill? (4) Proof of damages. The lease proves that you are responsible for damages, but it does not prove that there were damages. In other words, a copy of a lease is not proof that you owe money. A bill and vacate report is. That is what shows what was damaged and how much the landlord paid to fix it. Since the landlord no longer has such records, how can they prove you owe them for damages? Further, I would make the LL prove that they actually paid for said damages. LL's are nortorious for keeping deposits for "damage" and then not using that money to make the repairs. They keep billing tenant after tenant for the same damage. In many cities a LL can get fined and sued for pulling a stunt like that. (5) What to do. Make them prove there was damage and that they spent money above and beyond your security deposit to repair it. Take them to court if they fail to do so, or fail to drop the records if they can not.
OK for kicks I called TRU to see how they varified this charge ....and TRU said " they gave us your name ...DOB....SSN and thats all we need to verify a dispute" HA if that aint a kick in the A*#*....so now i think i'll send them a letter to validate these charges.
