late fees

[pamelatate]

I sent the rent on time and they sent the check back and asked us for a money order instead and are charging me 35dollars for late rent and also at the same day sent a 3day notice to pay or quit we had already sent the rent the day before in money orde now they want me to pay 25dollars for the 3 day notice can they charge me for this.

 

[JETX]

"Can" they charge you these fees?? Of course, they did charge you.

Are you required to pay these fees?? Based solely on your post, probably not.

What should you do?? I would certainly try to discuss these fees with 'them'.

However, lets look at the 'real' situation:
I assume that they didn't accept your check due to previous problems with your checks. If correct, then they certainly have every right to demand payment by money order or cashiers checks. If you knew about this requirement beforehand, and decided to 'test' them by offering a check at the last minute, then they are probably correct in charging you a late fee, since valid payment was NOT made on time. Now, as a result of the delay in payment (and possibly due to previous problems) they sent you a "3 day notice". If it is their standard policy to charge you a fee due to the notice, then you will also be stuck with that.

So, now the ball is in your court so to speak. If you were absolutely 'fault-free' talk with the landlord or manager to try to resolve this problem. However, if any of my above assumptions are valid, then you need to decide to pay the fees or face another probable vacate notice.

 

[JETX]

Re: late rent

You may have sent the rent check on time but did they receive it on time. As a landloard I expect to get the money on the day it is due, not to see the postmark on the envelope being the day it was due. Landloards have bills and mortgages to pay and if your check is late they may not be able to pay their bills on time.

With all due respect, if you are a LANDLORD, you should certainly be able to spell it correctly, not 'landloard' as you did twice.

And receiving the check late is not a sufficient excuse for returning it and then charging a late fee and a 'notice' fee.

There is something here that we are not privy to.

 

[I AM ALWAYS LIABLE]

My response:

The item that I think we're missing from the original writer is probably that the writer didn't deliver the FULL amount of the rent; e.g., perhaps 75 or 80 %. Doing so would also be good reason for the "Landloard" to return the check to our writer.

And, insofar as payment of late charges and "notice" fees, such responsibility for payment of those charges MUST be in the lease agreement. If not, our writer is not responsible for reimbursing the "landloard".

IAAL

p.s. Hey Steve ! I did it twice also, and it feels terrible to purposefully misspell an easy word. It was difficult to allow my fingers to do that. I had to "think" about it so that my fingers would spell "landloard" incorrectly !