Nastiness
January 10, 2009
So, here’s comes a long drawn out story.
We were renting a home in West Jordan, Utah, prior to the purchase of our home in September. Our move out date was September 30th and, according to Utah law, the landlord had 30 days to refund our deposit. I emailed him and sent him a certified letter at the beginning of September to notify him of our forwarding address. When I didn’t hear from him near the end of October, I sent him an email reiterating our forwarding address. This was jut a gentle reminder that he still owed us the $1145.
I didn’t hear from him, so I sent him another email around the 6th of November. I was cordial, once again, but also decided to call him to remind him about it. When I spoke with him, he said that he’d forgotten about the deposit and that he would send it shortly.
Nothing was received.
I emailed again on the 11th and got no response.
He emailed me on the 18th to tell me that he was going to send the refund by the end of the week. Nothing was received.
I emailed again on the 21st, as a little reminder. I got no response.
I emailed again on the 26th of November, to which the guy responded on the 1st of December. He said he was mailing a partial payment that day. I responded saying that I was glad to hear that he was sending something. I also said, “Let’s just work put a payment plan so I know what to expect and when. This will help keep us all from getting angry and bitter.” I was very very cordial in the email. I received a check for $200 on or around the 7th of December.
On or around the 1st of December, an attorney acquaintance of mine sent a certified letter to him alerting him to the fact that I would pursue legal action against him for failure to refund the deposit, blah blah blah.
During the preceding time, I also had called and left voice mail messages which were never returned. I must have called 5-8 times between 11/6 and 12/1.
After not hearing anything from him again, I decided to send an email to him on December 24th. I got no response to this email, nor to the voice mail I left him a couple of days later.
I decided to give it a little bit of time to see if he would just send me another check at the beginning of January. As of today, though, I have not received anything from him.
So, this brings up what I chose to do today. I decided that I would try to make contact with each of the tenants of his homes here in the Salt Lake Valley (the landlord lives in Arizona so I cannot confront him directly) and let them know what sort of person with whom they are doing business. If he chooses to not pay the money that he owes to me, perhaps he would choose to not pay his other tenants when they move out. I’m not under any obligation to be nice, at this point.
I stopped by the home in which I used to live, but nobody answered. I stopped by home number two but no grown-ups were apparently home, so the kids that were peeking through the window didn’t answer. No biggie. Home number three, though, had lots of grown-ups. They found what I had to say rather interesting. I explained that I am a former tenant of this yokel, and that his financial difficulties are preventing him from being able to pay me the refund to which I am entitled. I also explained that if he is having financial difficulties and cannot pay his mortgages, his homes could get foreclosed. In this scenario, the tenants would get evicted and they would not be entitled to any refund rents or deposits paid.
I did not say anything even remotely untrue or slanderous, just stating the facts and explaining that they may want to inquire with the landlord of their home’s mortgage status. My hope was that if they made contact with him, it could help him understand that I’m not playing the whole “phone tag” and “email tag” games anymore. I’m going to do whatever I need to do to get the money that is rightfully mine. Like I said, I’m not under any obligation to be nice. I want my money.
I then went to hom number four, but the parents in the family weren’t home. I left a message with the son who was there and gave my name and phone number. My plan was to inform them of the same things of which I informed the tenants of home number three.
After leaving home number three, a thought came to me. I remembered that the landlord has a real estate agent in the Salt Lake Valley and that agent has performed some rental management services for him. When I could recall his name, I looked him up and called him to inform him of the things that were transpiring. He was surprised to hear about what was going on and promised to call the landlord to see if he could push a button or two.
Well, it worked. Sort of.
Buttons got pushed, evidently, because I got a call from the landlord. He was, well, a little hot under the collar. He proceeded to tell me that I was blanking him and that I had better not piss him off otherwise I’d never get my blanking money or something like that. He kept going on and on about how much I was blanking him and that I could get myself to end up in jail by pulling stuff like this. Then he colorfully threatened the return of my money a few more times and hung up on me. Whatever, dude.
Overall, it was a pretty nasty phone call, and he must have dropped the F-Bomb 20 times during it. Apparently, the fact that he owes me money and won’t return calls and messages is my fault, and I’m a bad person for even asking for it. I just really can’t believe how the guy flew off the handle at me.
I guess it’s time to go to court. I’ll get some judgment against him and he’ll eventually have to pay.
Eventually.
Ouch.
Forget calling him, emailing him, etc. from here on out.
File a small-claims suit with your local courthouse. You’ll have to hire a server in AZ to give him the papers (about $45 give or take) and he’ll have to respond to your local courthouse with a guilty or innocent verdict IN PERSON. I’m guessing he’ll just pay your deposit back + court fees & the server fees.
Ugh. Terrible situation to be in.
I emailed him after the phone call and here is what I wrote:
“What did you expect me to do? If you don’t return my calls or emails,
it’s only logical that I’d have to try to find another way to get your
attention. Frankly, it appears to have worked. Perhaps you have some
suggestions for what else I could have done in my position? If you
had just been open with me and returned messages, just like I had
asked in numerous previous emails and voice mails, I wouldn’t have had
to take such drastic measures.
Also, I do find it rather humorous that you think I’m screwing you, as
you so, … uh, “directly” expressed in our phone call. The last I
checked, I don’t owe you anything. Considering how you are the person
who hasn’t paid me the money that’s owed me, it feels suspiciously
like I’m the one who’s getting screwed by you. You can point the
finger all you want but we both know the truth.
So, if you want to work out a payment plan, great, let’s do it. Even
if you have to say, “I can’t pay this month, let’s hope for next
month,” I understand that. I just don’t want you to forget about the
debt, as $1000 is a big deal to me, too. Let’s get the relationship
back to cordial, as opposed to the yelling and swearing that you did
at me today. That wasn’t exactly cool. If you continue to ignore my
emails and requests for dialogue, then I will do whatever I have to do
to get the debt paid, including suing you. I don’t want to have to do
that, as it’s not exactly a pleasant thing for either of us. So,
again, let’s communicate. Just be open and honest (and civil,
preferably) with me and I will be respectful of you and will keep your
other tenants out of it.”
His reply was as follows:
“It’s actually only $845 and I’ll send a payment as soon as possible. Any more slander on your part with anyone I might know and the payments will stop.”
My reply was:
“It’s actually $945 because the deposit amount was $1145 and you’ve only refunded $200.”
I wanted to get into the whole argument of what he considers slander, because I in no way slandered him. The common definitions all require that the statements be false, which, well, they aren’t. What a know-nothing jerk.
The absolute next step is to go to small claims court. I spoke with one of our attorneys at work, who just happens to be a former small claims court judge, and he told me that the landlord has absolutely no way of winning in court. None, nada, nil. The problem is that it won’t matter because getting the jerk to pay will be very difficult. We can get a judgment against him, but how would we collect? I guess we could get it tied to his house, but we would only get money if he actually was able to sell the house. The more likely scenario is that he would have his house foreclosed due to his financial difficulties, and this would lead to me not getting anything, as the first and second mortgage holders would eat up all of the proceeds. I’d be so far down the list that it would be impossible for me to get money.
The only thing the judgment would do would make it difficult for him to refinance anything or get any new loans. I’m okay with that, too. If he’s going to stiff me for money, then try to go on with life like nothing is wrong, he’s got another thing coming. I’d love for his attempt at keeping $1000 to cause him difficulties that cost him ten times that. That would be sort of poetic, and could only be made better by a scenario where he’d have all of those difficulties AND STILL have to pay me back!
yuck! i wish the sum owed were small and you could just walk away and move on. that is SO much money though. yuck!