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disclaimer: I am not the landlord or the tenant in this situation. I am just someone who saw an ad in the "free stuff" section on Craigslist.
The ad says, "Renters evicted and all must go. Today and tomorrow and junk man takes away saturday. dressers, beds, tv's dishes, expensive kitchen stuff, little girl's toys, blankets, clothes, tables, printer, aquarium with fish, misc stuff!!" There are pictures of the items, taken indoors, so the landlord may not have hauled them out to the curb yet (if it even matters).
My question is... can he do this legally? I thought he was supposed to throw away anything the ex-tenants don't take with them. Could he legally sell the items? And, am I at any risk here? Suppose he gives me a couple pieces of furniture, then it turns out he evicted them illegally or didn't follow some technicality. Am I then in possession of stolen goods?
EDIT: Meant to put this in the "renting" subforum. Sorry, mods, feel free to move it if you want.
Last edited by juspassingthru; 07-10-2014 at 04:30 PM..
Reason: note
What state is this ? Here is what CT state says:
"After the Execution is returned to you, you must give it to a state marshal for
service on the defendant. The Execution informs the
defendant that they must vacate the premises within
a minimum of 24 (twenty-four) hours or be physically
removed from the premises and if the defendant does
not move the defendant’s possessions and personal
effects they will be removed by the marshal and stored at the defendant’s expense. If the defendant does not
claim those belongings, they may be sold by the town.
"In a 24-Hour Lock Change Eviction, the landlord must provide a locksmith to change all the exterior locks during the scheduled eviction. Within 24 hours after the eviction, the landlord is given possession of the property. For the next 24 hours, the property is essentially treated as a storage facility and the landlord must give tenant reasonable access to remove personal property, but tenant may not remain in the property overnight. "
"In a 24-Hour Lock Change Eviction, the landlord must provide a locksmith to change all the exterior locks during the scheduled eviction. Within 24 hours after the eviction, the landlord is given possession of the property. For the next 24 hours, the property is essentially treated as a storage facility and the landlord must give tenant reasonable access to remove personal property, but tenant may not remain in the property overnight. "
The actual law VRLTA is Title 55, Chapter 13.-2 of the Code of Virginia. It states that the landlord has the right to assume the property is abandon if the tenant does not claim it within 24 hours of the abandonment. At that point the landlord must serve a notice on the tenants as prescribed and in the manner outlined in 55-248.33 and/or 55-248.6 of the VRLTA. That notice (depending on certain conditions) may be a 7 day or 10 day notice. Upon expiration of that notice, the landlord can dispose of the property.
If the landlord sells the property, the money is placed to the account of the tenants and can be used as payment of moneys owed. If the amount exceeds the amount owed, the landlord has to treat it like a security deposit and refund the remainder to the tenants under the security deposit requirements. The section of VRLTA that pertains to abandon personal property is 55-248.38.1.
Here they are only required to store it for 10 days.
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