dallas eviction help

[Boltfan]

SJ,

Are there punitive penalties for not following the laws regarding lockout? Are they worth pursuing?

[ShysterJon]

Originally Posted by Boltfan

SJ,

Are there punitive penalties for not following the laws regarding lockout? Are they worth pursuing?

Yes, a tenant has meaningful remedies if a landlord violates the law regarding lockouts. The following is the enforcement provision:

(h) If a landlord violates this section, the tenant may:
(1) either recover possession of the premises or terminate the lease; and
(2) recover from the landlord a civil penalty of one month's rent plus $1,000, actual damages, court costs, and reasonable attorney's fees in an action to recover property damages, actual expenses, or civil penalties, less any delinquent rent or other sums for which the tenant is liable to the landlord.

See Texas Property Code § 92.0081(h).

Recovering possession of the premises after an illegal lockout may take time. The procedures to follow are set forth in section 92.009 of the Property Code. Allowing a tenant to lawfully terminate the lease after an illegal lockout would prevent a landlord from accelerating the rent due on the lease, which they often do after a tenant's breach. (Acceleration allows a landlord to attempt to collect all the rent that would have been due during the entire term of the lease, minus rent actually received from reletting the apartment and reasonable expenses to find a new tenant.)

In addition, if a landlord changes the lock on the entry door to the apartment and then intentionally refuses to give the tenant a new key, even though the tenant is still delinquent in her rent, the tenant may recover from the landlord, in addition to the remedies provided by section 92.0081(h), a civil penalty of one month's rent. See Property Code § 92.0081(i).

I suspect that landlords often violate the law regarding lockouts out of ignorance. I represent three companies that own and/or manage apartment complexes, so I often file eviction cases (although I sometimes represent tenants, too). A few years ago I placed one of my best friends, a former provider, in an apartment owned by my client because she had eviction judgments and therefore could not lease at a nice property. She got behind in her (discounted) rent, and the manager of the complex put a lock box (like real estate agents use) on the lock to the front door without providing the notice required by law. The girl called me, and I found myself in the unique position of advocating for my friend against my client. Less than five minutes after I spoke with the manager, she removed the lock box. The CEO of the company was very concerned about the incident, and I wrote a memo outlining the law which he distributed to all the managers. So it was nice to help a friend and earn money by billing time to do it. Haha.

[Naomi4u]

Here's a question: How long does it take for an eviction to hit your credit report? Maybe she could get a new place before it does. Google says a minimum of 60 days.

[Jules Jaguar]

working on it, its hard especially right now

[ShysterJon]

Originally Posted by Naomi4u

Here's a question: How long does it take for an eviction to hit your credit report? Maybe she could get a new place before it does. Google says a minimum of 60 days.

I don't think it would be accurate to state that there's a specific, minimum amount of time before an eviction judgment would show up in a credit report. The judgment might only show up in a credit report if the landlord decided to have it recorded, which he may or may not do. The judgment, if recorded, would show up the next time the credit bureau bought records from the government agency that maintains the records of judgments.

If I were a tenant in Texas with an eviction judgment, I'd be concerned with being blacklisted by Texas Apartment Association properties. Pretty much all decent multi-family complexes in the state are TAA members. They maintain their own, private database and information is entered into the database whether or not a landlord gets a judgment recorded. If a person can't lease with a TAA property (or a small property that's not a TAA member), then they might have to live in an inferior property and pay more money for what they get.

I'd also be concerned with information being collected and reported by private companies other than credit bureaus that sell such information, such as www.PublicData.com. Anybody with a few bucks and some basic information about a person can buy a subscription to one of these private companies and find out whether a person defaulted on a lease. That information is also easily-obtainable on the web sites maintained by most county governments in Texas. For example, if I know your name and that you had an eviction judgment in Dallas County (whether or not that judgment was recorded), I can find that out in 30 seconds, no sweat.

From a practical standpoint, what this means is a tenant should default on a lease only as a last resort. Most landlords don't want to arbitrarily soil someone's credit history -- they want to get paid the rent they're due. If a tenant simply cannot pay their rent, I think they should do their utmost to work with the landlord to vacate the property to the satisfaction of both sides.

One final note: If a person has an old eviction judgment that they want off their record, I'd suggest they negotiate the amount to be paid with the landlord, then once a settlement amount is agreed upon, enter into a written settlement agreement which includes a term that the landlord will no longer report information regarding the tenant to either the TAA, credit bureaus, or companies that sell the information. If I'm negotiating a payoff of an eviction judgment (which, coincidentally, I'm doing right now for my free-spirited, yet financially-irresponsible, sugar baby), I want the landlord to cease reporting information about my client upon the payment of the first payment on the balance. Of course, if my client (or me, in the case of my sugar baby) defaults on making the payments, the landlord has the right to again report the information. The tenant has some bargaining power because the landlord rarely receives a penny when a tenant defaults on a lease, so he'll make concessions to get paid pennies on the dollar.

[Capt. Lincoln F. Stern]

Hmm how much time is left on the lease? Often you can "break" it if there are not alot of months left, agree to pay it out over time. Just never leave the place damaged. leave it pristine

[atlcomedy]

Originally Posted by ShysterJon

From a practical standpoint, what this means is a tenant should default on a lease only as a last resort. Most landlords don't want to arbitrarily soil someone's credit history -- they want to get paid the rent they're due. If a tenant simply cannot pay their rent, I think they should do their utmost to work with the landlord to vacate the property to the satisfaction of both sides.

.

Agreed. Try to figure out something that is workable. If you are broke, the landlord knows something is better than nothing and since most landlords really don't get their rocks off on screwing up people's credit, they'll take the something.

Originally Posted by Spirit13

Hmm how much time is left on the lease? Often you can "break" it if there are not alot of months left, agree to pay it out over time. Just never leave the place damaged. leave it pristine

True, many leases have reasonable "lease break" terms...the problem is by the time we are talking eviction you probably owe quite a bit in back rent, late fees, etc.

"Breaking a lease" (typically) only works well for the "good" (account current) tennant that needs to move because of a change in circumstances (e.g. they got a job in another town).