Taken Advantage of

[BeaufortSCGuy]

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


Let me give some look into how this all came about.

In 2012, my Mother-in-Law passed away, and left my wife roughly $200,000 in an inheritance, when she passed away, as I had been her caretaker full time, and had no job( she had MS), and the house that we were staying in was hers, we lost the house roughly overnight. We went to stay with a pair of friends of mine, who offered to let us stay there until I found another job in nursing, or something else. Shortly after they discovered the inheritence, by seeing the Metlife check on my wifes desk in our bedroom, they asked her if they could borrow $50,000 to pay off this rent-to-own trailer that they were staying in. My wife agreed thinking they were nice people, and went ahead and gave them a certified check for $51,000(an extra grand to cover closing fees, etc). We continued staying there for about another year afterwards, and then moved out as I had found another job, and needed extra room.

A year later after our lease was up at the place we rented, we moved back in for about 16 months, until one day they said they wanted us out, we had to leave now and load as much of our stuff into our car as we could, I still have almost all of my non-work clothes, and various other possessions there to this day. They have yet to pay back a single dime of the loan, and are holding all of my, and my wifes possessions hostage in a way, threatening to throw them out unless I pay them a storage fee.

At this point, I don't even want to be nice. Is there a legal precedent to take them to court, get them evicted from that place, and just get back on with our lives?

Me and my wife both work in the service industry, so lately we have been staying in a Confort Inn for a low fee of $400ish a month which is draining our ability to save up the money to consult with a lawyer just to see if we even have a case.


I am fairly sure this is not a small claim, however I have no idea where I should post this so I just put it here.

 

[quincy]

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


Let me give some look into how this all came about.

In 2012, my Mother-in-Law passed away, and left my wife roughly $200,000 in an inheritance, when she passed away, as I had been her caretaker full time, and had no job( she had MS), and the house that we were staying in was hers, we lost the house roughly overnight. We went to stay with a pair of friends of mine, who offered to let us stay there until I found another job in nursing, or something else. Shortly after they discovered the inheritence, by seeing the Metlife check on my wifes desk in our bedroom, they asked her if they could borrow $50,000 to pay off this rent-to-own trailer that they were staying in. My wife agreed thinking they were nice people, and went ahead and gave them a certified check for $51,000(an extra grand to cover closing fees, etc). We continued staying there for about another year afterwards, and then moved out as I had found another job, and needed extra room.

A year later after our lease was up at the place we rented, we moved back in for about 16 months, until one day they said they wanted us out, we had to leave now and load as much of our stuff into our car as we could, I still have almost all of my non-work clothes, and various other possessions there to this day. They have yet to pay back a single dime of the loan, and are holding all of my, and my wifes possessions hostage in a way, threatening to throw them out unless I pay them a storage fee.

At this point, I don't even want to be nice. Is there a legal precedent to take them to court, get them evicted from that place, and just get back on with our lives?

Me and my wife both work in the service industry, so lately we have been staying in a Confort Inn for a low fee of $400ish a month which is draining our ability to save up the money to consult with a lawyer just to see if we even have a case.

How long in total did you stay with the friends? Did you pay them rent or in any other way contribute to the cost of running the house (food, electricity, water, heat)? Or did you figure that the $50,000 you loaned them to pay off their home covered living with them for two+ years?

 

[BeaufortSCGuy]

We paid $600 a month in bills for the first stint(16-7 months), and on the second stint, about $270 monthly for the Cell Phone bill of everyone there, and another $3-400 regularly on groceries for the household as they did not want any more help than that. (sorry for edit, got a copy of all my checks written during that time)

Not to mention the paying of the property taxes on the property that we did the first 2 years of the loan agreement.

Looking at the Agreement, the timeline is like such

Mother-in-Law passes away sep-2012, we move in with them in November of 2012, agree to the loan in March of 2013, move out in Nov 1st of 2014. We also reinburse them for the discrepenscy when I had no income from Nov-2012, to March-13 with a $9,000 Certified Check(Highballing, but also thankful that we had a roof over our head)

Move back in on Oct 30th of 2014, and then get kicked out on the 12th of April, 2016.

When I last spoke with them, the Woman(who is a Paralegal at a Real Estate Law Firm!) wanted to prorate the loan based on how long we had stayed there.

 

[quincy]

The small claims limit in South Carolina is $7500.

 

[LdiJ]

We paid $600 a month in bills for the first stint(16-7 months), and on the second stint, about $270 monthly for the Cell Phone bill of everyone there, and another $3-400 regularly on groceries for the household as they did not want any more help than that. (sorry for edit, got a copy of all my checks written during that time)

Not to mention the paying of the property taxes on the property that we did the first 2 years of the loan agreement.

Looking at the Agreement, the timeline is like such

Mother-in-Law passes away sep-2012, we move in with them in November of 2012, agree to the loan in March of 2013, move out in Nov 1st of 2014. We also reinburse them for the discrepenscy when I had no income from Nov-2012, to March-13 with a $9,000 Certified Check(Highballing, but also thankful that we had a roof over our head)

Move back in on Oct 30th of 2014, and then get kicked out on the 12th of April, 2016.

When I last spoke with them, the Woman(who is a Paralegal at a Real Estate Law Firm!) wanted to prorate the loan based on how long we had stayed there.

The only way you are going to get your money (and your belongings) is to sue them. For that, it sounds like you are going to need an attorney.