A tale of two landlords.

Since we last visited the topic, I have collected $1569 of the $2030 our ex-landlord owes us. It has not been a terribly traumatic process for those of you arriving here after googling, "Ex Landlord is holding my stolen money how do I get it out of his aggravating clutches."

I walked to the courthouse, filled out some garnishment paperwork, for banks we knew he had accounts at (he deposited our rent checks into them), then walked to the banks and delivered the news. The bank then sat around, farting I presume, and then let us know how much money he had in his accounts with them.

The first bank held around $165 (disappointing) and the second a little over $1400 (more satisfying). The biggest expense of this process has been the emotional one where I'm so annoyed I can't just walk around the block and knock on his door every day asking for the rest of my money.

Then again it's been kind of fun to think of him going to his checking account and realizing, "Wait a minute....I had $1400 in here......where did it go??? SUMMMERS!!!!!!!"

Also fun: talking to a lawyer who knows a guy who arranges to have deputies come to the house to seize property. If it comes to that you guys? I will be out there with a lawn chair and a video camera. Jesus, I'll hold a party right there on the sidewalk.

But it hasn't come to that. After you win a small claims judgment you can collect money via garnishments of bank accounts, salary, and income from rental property. So we tried the banks, our ex landlord is self employed as far as I can tell...however, he has new tenants in his house in our dream neighborhood.

So today, for summer fun, we're going to the courthouse! The kids are SO EXCITED! We'll get our garnishment paperwork then on Saturday I'll deliver the paper to the new tenants and they will then be forewarned of the landlord's difficulty in following the law.

Logan's been consulting with a lawyer from work on this issue and in his last note he said, 'For a guy like me, this is the best part of practicing law. Making the bad guy pay." [paraphrased] And I was all, "For a girl like me too!"

I hate bullies in all forms.

In contrast, let's talk about our current landlord for a moment.

For a few days now, when I'm sitting outside on the back deck, I smelled rotting garbage every now and then. I moved our garbage cans to the garage and the smell remained, I went to the neighbor's back yard to check his garbage (since he's out of town) but there was no smell.

On Sunday night as we sat outside and I said to Logan, incredulously, "You seriously don't smell that?"

And he said, "No, I really don't."

And I said, "Well, you don't smell skunk either so your nose is broken."

As I tried to figure out where that stench was coming from I suddenly flashed to the oppossum we'd seen lumbering through the yard a few times since the spring. The one I'd caught Gary, the cat, hissing at under the deck once. I'm a fan of wildlife though, so I said, "Hey, you just go on and live your life little guy!"

I turned around and sure enough at the front corner of the deck a swarm of flies had gathered and when I went to investigate it was pretty clear the smell was coming from that spot.

Let that be a warning to us all, you welcome a possum to live under your deck, and he'll thank you by dying under there like a jerk. What an asshole.

We called the landlord and he said, "Eww, gross. I'll call someone to come out and remove it."

Let's just imagine how the conversation would have gone with the old landlord,

"Common Sense Folks! To keep wildlife from dying under the deck you have to SHOVEL THE SNOW AWAY FROM THE FOUNDATION OF THE HOUSE!"

Weeeee!

Comments

[homeslice]

or he could say something like, "geez, you people are trash - don't you know you can't ALLOW ANIMALS to die on the property??? i'm going to charge you an animal carcass fee when you move out."

[ashley]

I was going to ask you if you'd actually gotten any money from this ass hat when I saw you at the ball game on Tuesday, but quite frankly I'm sort of shy and socially awkward. Plus I was too busy retrieving water bottles from bleacher falls and trying to prevent my daughter from plunging to her death. I'm amazed that I even got up the gumption to ask you if your name was Melissa. I figured it was better than me constantly staring at you trying to figure out if it was really you and then you blogging about some freak who stared at you during your son's whole baseball game.

OK, carry on... Yeah for better land lords.

[Mitzi]

Landlords do that? Remove dead o'possums? Hmmm...good to know. I would have had my husband out there digging it out.

[Cat]

I've been following this drama for a while b/c I once had a landlord who charged ME for the plumber who came to fix the pipes after they froze because they were not insulated under the house. We were without water for a week, going to the gas station to take a dump, showering at relatives' homes, and HE charged ME for "allowing the pipes to freeze".

I'm getting my vindication vicariously through you.

[Daisy]

My fiance (who is from Detroit! squee!) is now a lawyer but in his past, Detroit life, he worked for a repo company. (Side note: he sails/is a sailor in his spare time and it was a repo company that repossessed boats.....) So he spent a summer or two repossessing boats, mostly of the large luxury yacht variety. He said the best fun was repossessing Aretha's boat (as in Franklin) becuase apparently she has a problem paying her "bills".

That story continues to amuse me and this seemed to be a pertinent place to share it.

[Elizabeth]

Hi, Melissa, just a heads up: Google Chrome is giving me a malware warning for your site b/c of the Flickr Flash & Burn application.

[Loosestring]

I am glad to hear you are getting your money back - even slowly but surely.

I once had a landlord who wanted me to pay to replace the refrigerator in my apartment that died while I was living there. The thing was an antique when I moved in. I politely informed him that I would be happy to do so but would take the new one with me when I moved. He had a new one installed the next day.

[Jennifer]

Wow, honestly I'm surprised to hear that you got a good chunk of your money back from the landlord -- good news!

And yeah, my Firefox is going nuts over that Flash And Burn thing attached to your pics. (It gives me a big "Do not go here!!" page.) I couldn't find any real info on it, so I've stayed away from the pics for now.

[MelissaSinGA]

You're a funny girl. Common sense....he's lucky you don't go all "Common Sense" on his a**! Well actually, I guess you have! HA!

[Sara]

Good for you, being so persistent to get your money back. I suppose the whole "landlord is a total jackass" thing helps a lot. We nearly had to go to small claims court to get our security deposit back a few years back. The MD/PhD student who owned our duplex was "very busy" or so she told me while she had a party at her house. Nice.

[mp]

So happy that SOMEONE is able to collect from garnishments! Not me, sadly. Still trying. Have a judgement for $1800 from a real jackass who thought he didn't need to continue paying my wages for freelance work. So like any good American, I sued him in small claims and got my judgement. I've tried to garnish his bank and got $0. Tried to garnish a "partner" he sometimes does work for, and got $0. Self-employment is so fun! He has NO INCOME (hence the whole not paying me thing, I suppose...) and I can't touch his wife's income. He rents his house, so no lien. I have one last option, but it's a yearly contract renewal so I have to wait several more months before attempting to collect that way. You're nicer than me, however. I caved out of frustration and sent him a "demand" email, hoping to shame him into coughing up the money, and it went unanswered. Shocking. So I'll just feel good that the system works for some - you!

[Nell]

Payback's a bitch. I love it and wish you would video the whole thing.

[carosgram]

Thanks for the update! I was wondering what was happening. Congrats to you.

[Why Mom Drinks Rum]

Oh hells yeah! That is just about the most satisfying thing I've read this week. I think I *heart* your legal system there. For serious.

Also, HA imagining his face!

Congrats....way to KICK IT TO HIS CROTCH.

[sbk]

Have you ever thought about knocking on the new tenants' door (in the Dream Neighborhood) to sit down to the Tale of the Douchebag Landlord? You know, to prepare them for the heartache/find a lawyer now...?

[reen]

Nicely played! I've had some real pieces of work for landlords - glad to hear you've found a better one.

[Tracy]

Wait - you get to show up at the new tenants' doorstep and do what? Legally force them to send their rent check to you instead of him? Oh God, I hope so. That is all kinds of awesome.

[jg]

One of my all time favorite posts ever.

[kate]

Wow. Dude picked the wrong couple to mess with.

Way to go on the garnishment! I would love to see the look on his face when he starts realizing he's bouncing checks all over town.

[HouseofJules]

It's too bad that in addition to the garnishments you can't deliver the dead animal to his doorstep, for dramatic effect. YAY for you guys! I love seeing the bad guys lose!

[amy]

Victory is sweet. So is a great landlord!

[april]

I ended up getting all by $50 of my judgement. Of course, I didn't have to garnish, becuase the evil wench finally gave in and finally paid.

We had a bunch of neighbrohood cats that depositited a dead rat under the front porch as a present, and we were not pleased. Called the landlord because it would require removal of her lattice and she said "Use newspaper and gloves". Then asked if we would clean up some of the huge tree roots we'd been telling her about for months "while we were under there".

[Maggie]

Ah, the sweet smell and taste of victory, or at least partial victory! Persistence and tenacity really do pay off.

[Elizabeth]

I had to garnish my ex-husband's wages to get my health insurance paid for...I was really surprised at how easy the process was. The only glitch I really ran into was actually with the Post Office, not the court (they lost the undelivered registered letter than I needed as proof that I had tried to contact him).

[Phil]

What's the legal ramification of flinging said dead oppossum through first landlord's bedroom window? Only wondering out loud...

[Peeved Michelle]

Dead possum. That's how I found out the city of L.A. has a service called "dead animal pick-up." You dial 611, tell the lady you need a dead animal pick-up and, in the morning, a guy with a shovel and the thickest, biggest black gloves I have ever seen comes into your yard and gets your dead possum.

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[AC Siapno]

Sounds yukky - is it worth it? I had an ex who stole over $2500 from me and I just ate it - it wasn't worth the time to me...

[MelissaS]

Wow, it's taken me a total of 2.5 hours to collect 75% of what we're owed. My hourly rate isn't that high.

So I guess your time is more worthwhile than mine!

[Elizabeth]

Hi again. It's me, "that kind of mom." Just wanted to let you know that I, too took my kids to court one day this summer. I even let my son bring a friend! I plead guilty to a speeding ticket, paid a boatload of money and spent a lot of time explaining things like why the judge didn't wear a white wig, why we had to stand when he entered the court etc. So you see, we have something in common. Court as a summer vacation activity...maybe you are "that kind of mom?"

[Tory]

I once had a crazy roommate who kept my security deposit. Nothing gave me greater pleasure than finally walking into the right office of the L.A courthouse to get garnishment papers and thinking about the deputy going into the doctor's office where she was a receptionist to deliver them....oh, and I got 7% interest. It was so worth the plane ticket back to San Francisco to take her ass to small claims.

[Kathryn]

re your opossum issue - I got back from vacation late Monday night to find that a baby skunk had taken up residence and DIED behind my fridge. I have no idea how it got in, but it did, poor thing. My hero of a landlord moved the fridge, disposed of the animal and then cleaned and sterilised the area for me.

Someone got a really nice bottle of wine delivered to his door the next day