Bought a house and old owners left stuff

[slliemab]

What is the name of your state? MI

We just purchased a home. When we signed the purchase agreement we were told we get immediate occupancy. When it was time to move the closets and basement were full of stuff. Some things contained other peoples personal information in a filing cabinet. They had some sort of business and it has tax info and stuff. I haven't gone through it but the outside of the drawers are labeled and I opened the drawers to see if they were empty, they are full. I closed them right back up after seeing that.

Other stuff we found was electronics, clothes, trophies and even furniture. We called the Realtor and it's been 3 weeks since they told us they would be here to get the stuff on the weekend but they never show. There is so much stuff that our things are piled up in corners in the basement. It's made it really hard to find some of our things because of the limited space and we just want to be able to unpack our things and settle in.

How long do we have to hold on to their stuff before we can start taking it out to the road?

We have a garage but it leaks and needs a new roof. Can we legally take their stuff out there if we cover everything up because we need to get on with our lives?

What are our rights here?

 

[slliemab]

So today as we were working in the garage we found a dog house up on top of stuff. There was a badly decomposed dead dog in there. We are pretty disgusted with those people.

We were all pretty shocked to see that.

 

[CraigFL]

You probably need to make a reasonable effort to let these people pick up their stuff. Make sure you communicate with these people in writing telling them they have 7 days or 14 days more to remove the items or it will be disposed of. Use registered mail with a return receipt allowing for delivery time for your removal date. If they don't comply, either haul it out to the curb of if you really think it has some value, you could store it in a storage shed and charge them for the storage.

 

[FarmerJ]

Locate your nearest michigan humane society or your county animal control officer to report your finding. They can determine if the dog was mistreated say by starvation.
Send them a letter about there things after you search for your states abandoned property laws Send the letter certified giving them the time listed by your states statutes to collect the things or every bit of it would be considered abandoned.

 

[sagito327]

So today as we were working in the garage we found a dog house up on top of stuff. There was a badly decomposed dead dog in there. We are pretty disgusted with those people.

We were all pretty shocked to see that.

Check under the floorboards! Just kidding. You entered the house 3 weeks ago and gave them ample notice to pick up their stuff. It is not your responsibility to babysit their mummified dog OR their old files for free. You should probably show the police the dog. As for their other stuff --chuck it, burn it, store it. Whatever.