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Legal Eviction of Roommates

Legal Eviction of Roommates

  • Posted: Aug 21, 2018
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Legal Eviction of Roommates

A living situation with roommates may become stressful if a roommate falls behind on rent or causes other problems in the home. The legal options for eviction of a roommate depend on whether the roommate is a legal occupant of the rental property, an unauthorized occupant, or a subletting party. The landlord, original tenant or either party might be able to pursue eviction by following the real-estate laws

Find Landlord and Tenant Help pages, Articles, and more on NationalEvictions.com


Sad Tenant moving apt after eviction sitting on the floor of the living room at home. NationalEvictions.com

Definition of Legal Occupant

A written lease agreement creates a legal obligation between each tenant and the landlord. A leases often require the names of all adults who will live in a rental home, along with the names of children or other adults who might spend time living in the residence. Whether a roommate is a legal occupant of a residence depends on whether the lease names the roommate as a lessee. If the roommate is lessee, the landlord can start eviction proceedings directly against the legal occupant.

Landlord’s Right to Evict

When a landlord wants to evict multiple roommates from a residence, States requires court proceedings for eviction, also known as “summary ejectment” under state law. North Carolina allows eviction based on one of three reasons: breach of the lease, nonpayment of rent or holdover of the premises after the end date specified by the lease. If the lessees fall behind on their rent payments, the landlord can initiate proceedings to evict all roommates, even if only one roommate is responsible for the past-due rent. Furthermore, if the lease specifically prohibits additional occupants or subletting parties, the landlord has the right to ask a North Carolina court for a summary ejectment based on a breach of the lease after a lessee allows a roommate to move in.

Legal Significance of Unauthorized Roommate or Subletting Party

A lease might state whether additional roommates may live in a rental home without signature of a new lease or advance permission from the landlord. A roommate who doesn’t appear on the lease usually doesn’t have a legal obligation to the rental home’s landlord; accordingly, the landlord can’t pursue late rent or directly take other legal action in North Carolina toward the unauthorized roommate. The roommate might have a sublease arrangement with the original lessee, however, and have a legal obligation toward a lessee who does appear on the lease agreement.

Tenant’s Right to Evict

If an original tenant allowed a roommate to move in without updating the lease with the landlord, the original tenant still might be able to pursue legal eviction of an unauthorized occupant. The original tenant and the new roommate might have an oral or written sublease agreement. If the roommate doesn’t pay rent or causes problems in the residence, the original tenant may be able to start legal proceedings for eviction based on the terms of the sublease. Legal eviction initiated by the landlord might result in a court order requiring all individuals to vacate the property and return possession of the premises to the landlord. Accordingly, the original lessee may need to take action independently if he wants to remain on the property himself. To evict a roommate, the original lessee must follow the notice, service and filing procedures required by North Carolina’s landlord-tenant laws.

 

 

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Young Lawyer Fights Against Unjust Evictions In Durham

Young Lawyer Fights Against Unjust Evictions In Durham

  • Posted: Aug 21, 2018
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Young Lawyer Fights Against Unjust Evictions In Durham

Find North Carolina Eviction Help for Landlords and Tenants on NationalEvictions.com

 

Jesse Hamilton McCoy II was raised by a single mother in low-income neighborhoods in Vance and Durham Counties. Growing up in the late 1980s and 1990s, he witnessed the drug epidemic firsthand and remembers not being able to trust some adults in the community because of their addiction.

It was one of those situations where you could see the look of shame on everybody’s face, and it was so misplaced.

He always thought becoming a doctor would be his ticket to a different life, but a run-in with police in middle school set him on a new course. An officer accused him of throwing rocks, despite McCoy’s hands being full of groceries he was bringing home for his mom. Police whisked him into their car, flipped on the sirens and drove him around before dropping him off in front of a crowd of neighbors. The incident left McCoy feeling vulnerable and voiceless and inspired him to make a career of fighting against injustice.

Today McCoy is a housing lawyer, the James Scott Farrin Lecturing Fellow at Duke Law and supervising attorney for the Duke Law Civil Justice Clinic. He focuses on running a new eviction diversion program that aims to reduce the number of people forced out of their homes in Durham County. The program mediates between landlords and tenants, litigates on behalf of renters who are being mistreated and helps tenants understand their legal rights.

 

Host Frank Stasio speaks with McCoy about his upbringing, his path to fighting for housing justice, and what the Durham eviction crisis looks like on the ground.

INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS

On living in Henderson, North Carolina during the 1980s:

When we were living in Vance County, I always tell people I was blessed to see sort of the best of times and the worst of times … It was definitely a low-income area, but I remember when we first got there there were a lot of seniors, a lot of very nice people, folks would watch other people’s kids. And then one of the biggest changes was we had three factories, and two of those factories ended up closing, I believe, within a two week gap from each other. So people went from being pretty happily employed and communal to desperation kinda setting in. And this was in the ’80s at the same time where crack was being distributed within the community, and I got to see the rapid decline of an otherwise vibrant neighborhood.

On writing romantic comedies to impress his classmates:

I started writing in middle school for the reason that all teenage boys write: I wanted girls to like me … I did a lot of, like, romantic-comedy books, because there was this whole Eric Jerome Dickey phase. I [had] just met Eric Jerome Dickey. I thought he was the greatest guy in the world. He autographed my book, and I said: I want to be like him when I grow up. And so I wrote novels that basically showed different personalities that I always [encountered] in school, and I would just mix them together. And people would get a kick out of basically sending my book around to everybody in the class – there was only one copy of it, and they would try to identify who was their character.

On police mistreating him when he was in middle school:

I was coming back with a friend from getting groceries – we used to go to the grocery store on Saturdays for our moms to get whatever they needed us to get from their list … A police car pulls up, cuts on the siren, stops us, police gets out of the car [and] asks us why we were throwing rocks in the road. Now keep in mind our hands were full of groceries, we weren’t throwing rocks .. Quickly it escalated to the point where we were being stuffed in the back of a car, and we thought we were going to be arrested, but weren’t arrested. He just rode around with the sirens going off until there was a nice crowd of people in the neighborhood and then opened the door and let us out with a stern warning about: Don’t do this anymore. Don’t throw rocks. It was one of those situations where you could see the look of shame on everybody’s face, and it was so misplaced. We felt like we wanted to take a stand against what this officer did to us, but you don’t really have any mechanism to do that … It was one of those things where it felt like we were supposed to accept that this was the way it was going to be … I said to myself: I want to be in a position when I grow up where I can actually represent this community … So that was really when I shifted my career decision from being a doctor to wanting to be an attorney.

On the effects of being evicted and the need for the Durham eviction diversion program:

There are a number of collateral consequences. It will affect the school district that your kids go to if you’re no longer able to stay in that community. It can actually increase the rate of homelessness. It can affect your ability to get employment if you don’t have a stable address. So with all these things in the aggregate, what we said is: We needed to see what parts can we fix through the litigation process … We view our role as a problem solver to help people who want to come to the table and work out resolutions [to] do so, but we also view our role as that of, if a landlord is actively doing things that are in violation of the statute and does not wish to participate, we do have that option of being able to pursue litigation against those landlords…

 

 

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Rental Maintenance Jobs You Or Your Tenants Should Never Try

Rental Maintenance Jobs You Or Your Tenants Should Never Try

  • Posted: Jun 27, 2018
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Rental Maintenance You Or Your Tenants Should Never Try

Fixing a paint job yourself that didn’t turn out right is one thing. However having to pay thousands of dollars for repairing the structural damages that resulted from a poorly done plumbing, electrical or HVAC job is another. Landlords will be taking money out of there pocket to fix problems when they let Tenants do the work.

“Leaving these maintenance projects to a professional will make what you spend worth the peace of mind and safety you’ll get in return.” – NationalEvictions

Hands-on Electrical Work

Repairing or re-configuring wiring is not do-it-yourself project. You might change a lightbulb or even install a new light fixture – maybe. But there is a reason why electricians charge higher rates. They have to go through extensive professional training to prepare for safely tackling wiring repairs. A property’s wiring/electrical configuration can be made unique by different electrical work being done throughout the years. This makes “one size fits all” procedures that are advertised online completely useless. The main risk of attempting electrical work yourself is being shocked or starting a fire. Both potentially deadly side effects to handling wiring without experience. Also doing it yourself can risk creating further damage that requires more extensive, and pricier, repairs down the road.

No. 2 – Gas Appliances

Working on gas appliances implies handling hazardous materials and facing potentially deadly side effects. Gas furnaces, ovens, water heaters or dryers should only be worked on by professionals. Turning off the gas while working on them is not a sufficient precaution. Gas leaks can easily be created by a poorly done project or reassembly. That could expose your rental home to a leak that could cause carbon monoxide poisoning, or worse, an actual explosion.

No. 3 –  HVAC

Our HVAC professionals strongly encourage property owners and tenants to stick to the basics. That means changing filters and cleaning around vents. Let the professionals handle anything more serious or complicated. Air conditioning and furnace repairs affect the air quality within a property. Poorly installed or maintained equipment can reduce efficiency and inflate. It can also be the root cause of respiratory infections and problems for those living and breathing in the property. Just like electrical professionals, HVAC professionals are required to undergo specialized training. That training allows them to obtain special licenses that legally allow them to work with certain materials. When refrigerants are concerned, one would not be complying with the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) regulations by working on air conditioning as a do-it-yourselfer.

No. 4 – Plumbing

That clogged drain might have been a piece of cake to work on. However major plumbing projects like re-routing existing plumbing or spot-fixing a leak is a whole different story. Water damage is extremely costly to repair. Even a small leak can be the culprit behind a plumbing-related emergency that costs a property thousands of dollars in damages.

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Reasons a Tenant Can Legally Break a Lease

Reasons a Tenant Can Legally Break a Lease

  • Posted: Oct 06, 2016
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Reasons a Tenant Can Legally Break a Lease

In most cases, a lease is a legally binding agreement that cannot be broken until the lease term has ended. There are however, certain times when a tenant is able to break the lease without fear of penalty. The reasons a tenant can break the lease will vary based on your state’s landlord tenant laws. Here are five reasons a tenant can legally terminate their lease agreement.

 

Failure to Maintain Fit and Habitable Premises

One of the main responsibilities every landlord has is the obligation to maintain the property.

Some common obligations include:

  • Making Sure the Property Has Running Water at All Times.
  • Providing Proper Trash Receptacles.
  • Keeping the Common Area Clean and in Good Repair.
  • Performing Repairs.
  • Following Health and Safety Codes.

If a tenant believes that there is a significant health or safety violation at the property, the tenant can file a complaint with the local health or safety department or other property inspection organization or can file a complaint directly with the landlord.

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Toolkit: 15 Must Have Essentials for Renters.

Toolkit: 15 Must Have Essentials for Renters.

  • Posted: Aug 24, 2016
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During the first year of living in my first ‘real’ apartment, my now-husband’s family asked what they could get me for my birthday. I responded by asking for a power drill. While I think they thought it was a strange request, they obliged, and ten years later it’s still one of my most used tools. Just because you don’t own your home doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have your own toolkit for repairs and improvement.

Here a list of what got us through several years of renting without fail, doesn’t take up much space, and now gets plenty of use with us in our first home:

1. Power Drill
2. Screw Driver Set
3. Hammer
4. Duct Tape
5. Tape Measure
6. Wire
7. Extension Cords / Power Strip
8. Utility Knife
9. Flashlight
10. Step Stool (or ladder)
11. Allen Wrenches
12. Pliers
13. Level
14. Scissors
15. Assortment of fasteners, hooks, hanging strips and reusable poster tack

This small list will allow you to do most any repairs needed in the apt or home you live in.

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