CarlWinslow27
New Member
My jurisdiction is: Orlando, FL
Hello all,
Here's my situation(Its kind of long, be forewarned): 3 months ago I was renting a room at a friends place when unexpectedly we were all told we had just 2 weeks to vacate the property. We were being evicted. The sheriff came and knocked on the door and everything. The landlord wanted to re-model and sell the house and the excuse he gave us was "because of the fact that we were one month behind on paying rent".
Now, the thing is, my friends always paid the landlord at least 3 months worth of rent at-a-time, in advance, never late, for a year and a half. Matter of fact, we were about to pay him the late rent too. To add fuel to the fire, the landlord also chose to file lawsuit against my friends. Makes absolutely no sense to me, but whatever thats just the setup to our current situation.
Since we were only given two weeks to leave, we had to frantically search for a place to move into and the only property we found was on craigslist.
The ad described a realty company which rented out forclosed homes on a month to month basis; there was no credit check, no application fee, and no guarantee of even a 6 month lease. The rent was suspiciously cheap but it makes sense because potential renters could be evicted at any possible moment.
It seemed to good to be true; its a 4 bedroom/2 bath house in a quiet, very safe neighborhood located right next to a major shopping center. I'm not sure if I'm allowed to disclose price in this forum so I'll say the monthly rent is about the same as what a one bedroom studio goes for in the area.
Alright, what raised the first red flag for us was the fact that the landlord has never met us face to face. He didnt even show us the house; what he did was give us the code to the lockbox on the front door and he let us check it out ourselves. After looking at the place we were all very satisfied with it so we decided to go ahead and rent it.
When we had to drop off the first months rent and deposit he had us go to an office building where he said his office was, but apparently the suite # he gave us didnt exist.
We asked the receptionist about the suite #, and asked about the landlord's name and company name, and guess what, she no record of anything.
BUT, what she did have, was a padded envelope on her desk with the address of our rental property written in marker on it. Inside the envelope were 2 copies of the lease, one for us, one for him obviously, and instructions saying to leave the 1st months rent and deposit, in cash, inside the envelope.
This raised yet another red flag so we called the guy. After about 30 min of trying to get ahold of him we spoke to him and he said his style of doing business was very casual and laid back. "A little TOO laid back" was what we all thought, so we told him that we were VERY uncomfortable with simply leaving that large of an amount of cash in an envelope in some random office, with some random receptionist.
Anyway, he says to go ahead and move in, and he'll send one of his employees to come pick up the money in person. And sure enough, a few days later, someone comes by and picks up the money. A month goes by, same deal, the guy comes around, we pay him, everything seems fine.
Alright heres where things start to get really suspicious, and I know what you're thinking, this whole mess was already incredibly suspicious from the onset.
Apparently, another house on our same street is owned by the same bank, which is also in forclosure it seems. And every month or so some guys come by to cut the grass at that house, and our house.
Well, one day the guys who cut the grass came and knocked on our door saying they had no idea there were people staying at this house, so they had to take a picture of me and get my name. They said it was to show the bank, so they were no longer responsible for cutting the grass here.
This worried us, and upon doing a little research on the internet, we found that people we running this same kind of scam all over the US.
Talking amongst ourselves we asked, "well, if this is a scam, how was he able to gain access to the keys to the house, and strike up a lease?". Apparently, according to what we read on the internet, getting a access to the keys is extremely easy, and a lease can be made by any fool w/ a printer or photocopier.
So, my question is, in the event that the Sheriff shows up at the door saying we have 72 hours to move out, what legal rights do I have? Is there any way, shape, or form that this type of deal is legal?
We went into this thing believing it was 100% legal and legitimate, and the fact that he gave us keys to the house as well as a lease gave us no reason to question anything.
ANY advice is greatly appreciated.
Hello all,
Here's my situation(Its kind of long, be forewarned): 3 months ago I was renting a room at a friends place when unexpectedly we were all told we had just 2 weeks to vacate the property. We were being evicted. The sheriff came and knocked on the door and everything. The landlord wanted to re-model and sell the house and the excuse he gave us was "because of the fact that we were one month behind on paying rent".
Now, the thing is, my friends always paid the landlord at least 3 months worth of rent at-a-time, in advance, never late, for a year and a half. Matter of fact, we were about to pay him the late rent too. To add fuel to the fire, the landlord also chose to file lawsuit against my friends. Makes absolutely no sense to me, but whatever thats just the setup to our current situation.
Since we were only given two weeks to leave, we had to frantically search for a place to move into and the only property we found was on craigslist.
The ad described a realty company which rented out forclosed homes on a month to month basis; there was no credit check, no application fee, and no guarantee of even a 6 month lease. The rent was suspiciously cheap but it makes sense because potential renters could be evicted at any possible moment.
It seemed to good to be true; its a 4 bedroom/2 bath house in a quiet, very safe neighborhood located right next to a major shopping center. I'm not sure if I'm allowed to disclose price in this forum so I'll say the monthly rent is about the same as what a one bedroom studio goes for in the area.
Alright, what raised the first red flag for us was the fact that the landlord has never met us face to face. He didnt even show us the house; what he did was give us the code to the lockbox on the front door and he let us check it out ourselves. After looking at the place we were all very satisfied with it so we decided to go ahead and rent it.
When we had to drop off the first months rent and deposit he had us go to an office building where he said his office was, but apparently the suite # he gave us didnt exist.
We asked the receptionist about the suite #, and asked about the landlord's name and company name, and guess what, she no record of anything.
BUT, what she did have, was a padded envelope on her desk with the address of our rental property written in marker on it. Inside the envelope were 2 copies of the lease, one for us, one for him obviously, and instructions saying to leave the 1st months rent and deposit, in cash, inside the envelope.
This raised yet another red flag so we called the guy. After about 30 min of trying to get ahold of him we spoke to him and he said his style of doing business was very casual and laid back. "A little TOO laid back" was what we all thought, so we told him that we were VERY uncomfortable with simply leaving that large of an amount of cash in an envelope in some random office, with some random receptionist.
Anyway, he says to go ahead and move in, and he'll send one of his employees to come pick up the money in person. And sure enough, a few days later, someone comes by and picks up the money. A month goes by, same deal, the guy comes around, we pay him, everything seems fine.
Alright heres where things start to get really suspicious, and I know what you're thinking, this whole mess was already incredibly suspicious from the onset.
Apparently, another house on our same street is owned by the same bank, which is also in forclosure it seems. And every month or so some guys come by to cut the grass at that house, and our house.
Well, one day the guys who cut the grass came and knocked on our door saying they had no idea there were people staying at this house, so they had to take a picture of me and get my name. They said it was to show the bank, so they were no longer responsible for cutting the grass here.
This worried us, and upon doing a little research on the internet, we found that people we running this same kind of scam all over the US.
Talking amongst ourselves we asked, "well, if this is a scam, how was he able to gain access to the keys to the house, and strike up a lease?". Apparently, according to what we read on the internet, getting a access to the keys is extremely easy, and a lease can be made by any fool w/ a printer or photocopier.
So, my question is, in the event that the Sheriff shows up at the door saying we have 72 hours to move out, what legal rights do I have? Is there any way, shape, or form that this type of deal is legal?
We went into this thing believing it was 100% legal and legitimate, and the fact that he gave us keys to the house as well as a lease gave us no reason to question anything.
ANY advice is greatly appreciated.
