Co-signed lease. Please help!!!

[ortwinej]

I co-signed a lease with my ex-fiancee about 1 year ago. Less than midway through the lease she decided to leave. I continued paying. We had an unwritten agreement that she would not seek child support until I got us out of the lease. After about 6 months we finally found a subleasee. I also received a letter from the state about back child support. To recoup this I sued her in small claims. Rent(in Michigan) was $840 a month. I asked for half of rent from the time she left. Rent was paid by me each month. The lease states under our names "Jointly and severally". Do I have a case? This is where it gets interesting. She filed a counter claim asking for money for her lawayer(for custody)and bills she paid. All bills were in her name. She seeks money for the lawyer because she states she needed custody of the children because I may have been going to jail(I was caught giving alcohol to a minor.Big mistake. Lesson learned). I was told I was never in danger of facing jail time, and I told her this. And in fact she has physical custody and we both have legal custody. Can anyone sort this mess out!!!??? Please help!!!

 

[JETX]

Simply, based on your post, here are the issues:

1) You jointly rented a residence.
Depending on what caused your 'ex' to move, you might be able to recover her share of the rent. For example, if you kicked her out or made her move (without sufficient notice), you will probably have a hard time getting repayment. This would be because you caused her breach. (And don't forget the issue of security deposit. If from shared income, she gets her share back).

2) Your post says that she filed against you for bills she paid but you don't say what they were for.
If they were joint bills and she paid them, she is entitled to recover a percentage (50%?) from you for her payment.

3) Her attorney fees. This is the unknown. Dependant on what her basis for claim is, she might be able to recover at least part of her expenses.

As I see it, you are trying to recover about $2520 (50% of $840 for 6 months). She is trying to recover unknown bill repayment and attorney fees. Sit down and try to work this out, it will probably be close to a 'wash' anyway.

All the other stuff about verbal non-child agreement, possible jail time, child support, etc. is just confusing the simple facts.