Being evicted

[Turkeysammich]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Georgia

I live with my Mom, while waiting for college to start back, if we're evicted, I can't go.

My Mom is caught up on rent, what she is not caught up on is the power bill, which is in the landlord's name, they refused to switch it over.

The place is a shanty, cheap plywood ceiling, tin roof. When we first moved in, it was infested with brown recluse spiders, we had to take care of them ourselves. The roof leaks bad when it rains, and the stacked washer and dryer was old and caught the bathroom wall on fire. I didn't even know until an officer showed up and said that the mobile home tags were expired that this place used to be a trailer. We've been here a year and the landlord has yet to move out all of their furniture, we're cramped in here with our stuff, plus theirs, but we can't afford to move, when we're evicted, that's it, we're homeless. There is a giant hole in the wall, where the air conditioner unit is, it is not insulated, so it takes a ton of power to run, we've tried to get them to fix that, and the roof many times.

The reason she fell behind on the power bill, aside from the air conditioner, was that there was a winter storm and trees knocked over the power lines, the power company charged $600 for cutting them down.

We didn't get a notice that we were going to be evicted, only the court summons. Before we received the summons, my Mom had already made an agreement with the landlord to make extra monthly payments, but the landlord had passed dealings with us to his "son" (they don't know that he's his son, they just assume, he's not legally his son.) to give him a little more say in the business. The "son" is not on our lease, and he is the one who had the landlord's wife file the eviction, and the landlord is now backing them, despite having made an agreement with my Mom. The "son" has knocked down every offer my Mom has made, she can't offer anymore or that would bring us to starve. She made one more offer, but he's ignoring it, instead waiting on the deadline that he gave her. We still have the court date.

Our landlord is also my Grandma's landlord, who was just recently diagnosed with lung cancer, she'll be starting chemo in a few days, my Mom moved here close to her so that she could take care of her, if we are evicted, she won't be able to and my Grandma, most likely won't make it.

If he doesn't accept her offer, I don't know what our options are, we'll be homeless, my college career dead, my Grandma without the help she needs.

 

[Gail in Georgia]

I'm sorry you are going through all of this but there is a lot of empty non-legal stuff in your posting.

The bottom line is that if you have received a court summons this means your landlord has filed for a dispossessory (an eviction; the term used in Georgia) and your mother has a certain amount of time to respond to this summons.

If she does, a hearing will be set up where both parties can explain their side as to why this request for an eviction should or should not go through. Your mother can present her agreement she made about catching up with the owed power bill and clearly stress that she is up to date on the rent.

If she does NOT respond to the summons or does NOT attend any hearing the request for the eviction will be granted so it is important that she do her part in responding to this matter.

Good luck.

Gail

 

[LdiJ]

I'm sorry you are going through all of this but there is a lot of empty non-legal stuff in your posting.

The bottom line is that if you have received a court summons this means your landlord has filed for a dispossessory (an eviction; the term used in Georgia) and your mother has a certain amount of time to respond to this summons.

If she does, a hearing will be set up where both parties can explain their side as to why this request for an eviction should or should not go through. Your mother can present her agreement she made about catching up with the owed power bill and clearly stress that she is up to date on the rent.

If she does NOT respond to the summons or does NOT attend any hearing the request for the eviction will be granted so it is important that she do her part in responding to this matter.

Good luck.

Gail

I agree with this but something did strike me that might be helpful to mom in court.

If the reason the power bill is behind is because of the 600.00 charged by the power company for tree removal, there is some argument to be made that that is not mom's responsibility, but rather the landlord's.

 

[Gail in Georgia]

I agree; I'm not really certain why this is the tenants responsibility in the first place (and depending on the situation the power company itself is often responsible for maintaining their lines).

Gail

 

[Turkeysammich]

What about the "Improper notice" or "Unfit Housing" defenses? The only notice we received, was from the officer delivering the court summons.

 

[LdiJ]

What about the "Improper notice" or "Unfit Housing" defenses? The only notice we received, was from the officer delivering the court summons.

You can argue the improper notice but proving the home unfit will just cause you to lose the home anyway, as it would get condemned.

 

[Turkeysammich]

They've come to a deal, but the landlord's son isn't to happy about it, he's blabbing our problems to everyone in the area. Saying whenever he drives by the house, every light in the place is on, which isn't, I make sure to turn all the lights out, and he's telling them how much we owe, even telling my Grandma who's going through chemo and doesn't need the stress. Isn't this some breach of lease? Can he tell people our business an get away with it?

The power issue is because of old equipment that they buy from auctions, the refrigerator and water heater both look to be 30 years old, the central air unit, even older, and isn't insulated, matter of fact, the intake is just a square hole in the wall. Our power bill is 3 times what everyone else's is, but our place is smaller. I make sure to turn out all the lights, all our electronics are power savers, and don't even run all day.