ohiolandlord
02-08-2006, 08:45 PM
Foreclosure
I hope someone on here can help me... Here is the situation, My aunt has been living in the same house for 17 years and 4 years ago her house was sold and she has continued to to live there and pay rent. She has been told to move out 3 or 4 times because he has not been paying the mortage even though she has been paying him. She has recieved a letter telling her to vacate the property due to it being in foreclosuer. My question is he is wanting them to continue to pay rent and live there. She wants to find out if it is still in foreclosure does anyone have any ideas on how she would do this?
In Ohio, the tenant's right to the premises is dependent upon the owner's right to the premises. If it turns out that the person she was renting from was either not the owner (rare) or that the owner's right to the property was dependent upon his paying his mortgage and he was not doing it, the bank can sweep in and take the place over, and put out both the tenant and the owner.
Your aunt would have a cause of action against the owner for breaching the covenant of quiet enjoyment that the owner had with her. The covenant of quiet enjoyment is implied into every rental contract and it means that the owner promises that he has sufficient ownership interest in the property to assure the renter that she will not be displaced from the property during the lease term by someone with better title to the property than the owner (such as a bank when the owner isn't making the mortgage payments).
The trouble with a lawsuit against such an owner is that such owners are usually swirling around the toilet bowl and heading down into the septic tank financially. Even if you win a big judgment against them, you can't get blood out of a stone. There is usually no deep pockets defendant to collect from.
It's quite a scam where the owner collects as much rent as he can for as long as he can, never pays the mortgage, and then the tenant is kicked out during the foreclosure. How the tenant wants to play it (quit paying the rent and live rent free for a few months as well and then get kicked out) or pay the owner (since had the owner been honest, she still would have had to pay rent) is her call.
It's fairly easy to check up on the progress of the lawsuit if you know the name of the owner. Just go to the county courthouse in the county in whcih the property is located and look up the name on the computer (in some places you can do this online). If you find the foreclosure case, the computer will usually be able to tell you what stage the proceedings are in. It's all public record.
To learn more about your rights as a tenant in the State of Ohio, you might want to consider downloading our book online at http://www.ohiolandlordtenant.com/book.html
Last edited on Thu Jan 12th, 2006 09:32 pm by Eric E. Willison
I hope someone on here can help me... Here is the situation, My aunt has been living in the same house for 17 years and 4 years ago her house was sold and she has continued to to live there and pay rent. She has been told to move out 3 or 4 times because he has not been paying the mortage even though she has been paying him. She has recieved a letter telling her to vacate the property due to it being in foreclosuer. My question is he is wanting them to continue to pay rent and live there. She wants to find out if it is still in foreclosure does anyone have any ideas on how she would do this?
In Ohio, the tenant's right to the premises is dependent upon the owner's right to the premises. If it turns out that the person she was renting from was either not the owner (rare) or that the owner's right to the property was dependent upon his paying his mortgage and he was not doing it, the bank can sweep in and take the place over, and put out both the tenant and the owner.
Your aunt would have a cause of action against the owner for breaching the covenant of quiet enjoyment that the owner had with her. The covenant of quiet enjoyment is implied into every rental contract and it means that the owner promises that he has sufficient ownership interest in the property to assure the renter that she will not be displaced from the property during the lease term by someone with better title to the property than the owner (such as a bank when the owner isn't making the mortgage payments).
The trouble with a lawsuit against such an owner is that such owners are usually swirling around the toilet bowl and heading down into the septic tank financially. Even if you win a big judgment against them, you can't get blood out of a stone. There is usually no deep pockets defendant to collect from.
It's quite a scam where the owner collects as much rent as he can for as long as he can, never pays the mortgage, and then the tenant is kicked out during the foreclosure. How the tenant wants to play it (quit paying the rent and live rent free for a few months as well and then get kicked out) or pay the owner (since had the owner been honest, she still would have had to pay rent) is her call.
It's fairly easy to check up on the progress of the lawsuit if you know the name of the owner. Just go to the county courthouse in the county in whcih the property is located and look up the name on the computer (in some places you can do this online). If you find the foreclosure case, the computer will usually be able to tell you what stage the proceedings are in. It's all public record.
To learn more about your rights as a tenant in the State of Ohio, you might want to consider downloading our book online at http://www.ohiolandlordtenant.com/book.html
Last edited on Thu Jan 12th, 2006 09:32 pm by Eric E. Willison