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Rental location is in NJ. Landlord is out of state. Landlord is asking more money over and above deposit amount. Couple of questions:
1. If tenant sues landlord does the landlord have to appear in person to Nj court?
2. If landLord sues tenant, can she file in her local court ( landlord is in CA )? Or she has to file in the court where the property is located?
3. It has been more than two months post lease end date, she has already provided a list of items for damage within 30 days. Can she keep on adding new expenses for list of damages to the one already submitted?
PS : no legal action taken from either parties.
3. Yes. If additional damages are found, you can be charged if the landlord can prove that your the culprit.
Thanks. But If that is the case what is the point of doing a formal inspection and providing list of all issues. It will always be open ended for the tenant, landlord will continue to have a winning hand.
Agree 100% with reenz on 1 and 2, not sure about 3, because usually there's a deadline - depends on how the law is written. Just google security deposit laws for NJ. I don't know NJ laws and would just have to Google them, which you can do for yourself.
Rental location is in NJ. Landlord is out of state. Landlord is asking more money over and above deposit amount. Couple of questions:
1. If tenant sues landlord does the landlord have to appear in person to Nj court?
2. If landLord sues tenant, can she file in her local court ( landlord is in CA )? Or she has to file in the court where the property is located?
3. It has been more than two months post lease end date, she has already provided a list of items for damage within 30 days. Can she keep on adding new expenses for list of damages to the one already submitted?
PS : no legal action taken from either parties.
Lawsuits are usually filed in the state the agreement/property is located
Depends on what your state laws are for timelines
No she can’t add more damages after she submitted her repair list/security refund. The submitted list within the allotted time should of been sufficient to find/fix all damages
She can take you to court for additional found damage.
Rental location is in NJ. Landlord is out of state. Landlord is asking more money over and above deposit amount. Couple of questions:
1. If tenant sues landlord does the landlord have to appear in person to Nj court?
2. If landLord sues tenant, can she file in her local court ( landlord is in CA )? Or she has to file in the court where the property is located?
3. It has been more than two months post lease end date, she has already provided a list of items for damage within 30 days. Can she keep on adding new expenses for list of damages to the one already submitted?
PS : no legal action taken from either parties.
1. Technically no, the LL can have a lawyer appear for them.
2. No. Yes, jurisdiction will be based on the location of the rental property.
3. The refund and accounting has to be done in the timeline. If more items are discovered after that timeline the LL can come after you separately for that. A few states security deposit rules do make it so if a LL misses the deadline then they forfeit all rights to any claims no matter how legitimate. Read your states laws.
Landlord can have a representative (usually an attorney) do the appearance. The suit would have to be in the state where the unit is located, unless you signed the lease in another state. If there are damages that only became evident after the 30 day period, the LL can document that and add that to his list; for instance, if you were responsible for the utilities, and you were stealing utilities from another meter, and the utility company discovered this, and held the LL responsible for your violation. But the LL would have to make a compelling case to the court that there was no way that they could have discovered the damage within the 30 day period after your lease ended.
I'm assuming that the LL held you responsible for an amount over the entire deposit, and did not return any of the deposit, but did give you an accounting within the thirty days? If she didn't return the amount of the deposit that wasn't eaten up by her listed damages at 30 days, you can sue her in small claims court, and you will win. In most states, you would get twice or thrice the amount owed to you, plus court costs.
Just wanted to clarify that if the tenant sues in small claims court, in most states lawyers are not allowed. So, the landlord would have to find a suitable "agent" to represent them, and that normally must be an employee. For instance, if I sue my employer, and name the owner, he can send one of his employees who is a manager to represent him or her. But, not a lawyer.
If the landlord doesn't have employees in NJ he can send in to represent him, he would have to fly back to NJ to show up in court. If he chooses not to, and he can't send an acceptable agent, in that case (and if lawyers aren't allowed), he would lose by default.
I don't know NJ laws. But, as an example in CA - if I have a private landlord who lives in NJ, but I'm renting a house from him here in CA. I can sue the landlord in CA small claims court. He can't send anyone to represent him, except by a regular employee or a property manager who worked for him on your property and - who was not hired only to represent him in small claims court for your lawsuit.
The bottom line is he can't hire someone who has only been hired to represent him in court. He otherwise has to show up.
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