Legal Question in Landlord & Tenant Law in Utah

i have two questions:

for staters, i live in a house thats broken into four apts, or a 4- plex. We recently got a note on the door saying this house will go to public auction if the owner doesn't take financial responsibility. The property is only worth $140,000 and this owner is in debt 307,000 as of sept 2, 2010. Our landlord has told us the owner is so in debt that he wait for it to go to public auction, then using an investment company buys it bac kfor very cheap. Isnt this fraud? As well, if we have got this notice, we are pretty sure the bank owns this place, which we feel now our landlord is illegally collecting rent. He told us after confronting him about this notice, that he was going to give us our rent back we paid 6 days ago, by having acess to the owner bank account. This seems very fishy, he gthen told us he was not going to collect rent in this place anymore, which also gi ves us reason top believe he is illegally copllecting rent. Also, I have been living with these girls for a month now, I am not in the contract but there was a verbal agreement made between The landlord, the girls i live with and I. Does this hold up as me being a actual tenant in this place?


Asked on 8/07/10, 12:20 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys
Cory Wall Cory R. Wall, Attorney at Law, P.C.

If the house is going to public auction, it generally means it's in foreclosure and until it's actually foreclosed on, the owner still literally owns the property and is entitled to collect rent. If the owner allows it to go to foreclosure sale and manages to have a separate legal entity buy the property at the sale, it's probably technically legal, although not moral. With respect to your agreement, some of it would depend on whether the girls have a written contract with the landlord. Usually, if there is a written contract, then that is what controls inspite of any verbal side agreements. However, as between yourself and the girls, they may have a claim against you for your share of rent if you and they have entered into some kind of verbal contract with you as a sort of subtenant of the property.

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Answered on 8/20/10, 12:34 pm


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