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EMERGENCY: tennant+collection agency try to sue, rip me off.

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EMERGENCY: tennant+collection agency try to sue, rip me off.

Postby rippedOff » Sun Aug 13, 2006 9:49 pm

I have a desperate situation court is thurstday.
I lived in an apartment. 5 and a half years after I moved out I receive a call from attorney(never received a call from collection agency)
that I owe 3000$ in damages + 10% interest for each year. I never received
a bill, call or anything notifying me about the dept although I lived in a house
and my phone number did not change in 10 years. I have no way to dispute the bill because all records in leasing company are destroyd after 3 years.
the court documents they sent me have records all years except 2000 when I moved out. move out document that they provide says that I moved out a month after I actually moved out. I went to the office and asked someone for my move out document. and she gave me by mistake a document that says I moved out in august, not in september as their court document states.

here is what they do: they work with collection agency, who sent the bills to some imaginary address for 5 years. they MUST however know my exact address since they know my social security number. now collection agency is sueing me for damages(3000$), interest + their court expenses.
their damage bill is made up. (but I can't prove it because I don't have original copy). after three years apertment company destroys all documents. and they have 6 years to file in collection agency.

I found this document, but lawer that I consulted with said that it not against the law to sent bills to wrong address.(but where did they get that
wrong address, they had my SSN).
http://www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fdcpa/fdcpact.htm
the problem is that they did not show records for 2000 in first hearing. I got records for 2000 from office lady(who did not know what was going on) and the document says that I moved out in august of 2000 not in september of 2000. so they provided false document in court and want money for september.
rippedOff
 
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Postby TenantNet » Sun Aug 13, 2006 10:38 pm

Please ... slow down and present the problem in a more linear way. You're bouncing around and it's difficult to follow. What kind of apartment was this? Where? Also, read the Forum Guidelines and do not post the same message to multiple area (we deleted the other two).
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Postby rippedOff » Mon Aug 14, 2006 6:54 pm

hi, I appologize if I violated the rules of this forum.
I desperately need help. there must be a law that they are
violating. this can't be happening.
I just can't pay all those made up charges.
here is what happened in detail:

we lived in La Mirada appartments, Tucson AZ, 4515 E. Grant rd. owned
by EquityIV since october 1997 till august 25 2000.
my mother has lung decease and doctor recomended to move to another
area because the area we lived in had heavy traffic and dust. we gave doctor's referal to appartment maneger. maneger agreed to break the lease
without any additional charges. we moved out on august 25 2000. and moved
to other appartments in a different district. we have documents that we actually moved in on aug 25. my kids went to school in new district on aug26.
we lived in new appartment for 3 years. in july 2003 we bought a house and lived there up until now.

after we moved out from La Mirada appartments we never received a bill, phone call or any notice that we owe any money. it's been 5 and a half years. about a month ago I received a phone call from an attorney to whom the collection agency handed our case. we don't know why they handed the case to attorney. neither appartment nor collection agency ever contacted us even though our phone number remained the same for 10 years. The attorney called and said " you owe 3000$,+ 10% of yearly interest. are you going to pay this amount?" I said I never heard from anyone that I owe any money to anyone and not going to pay. he said
he will sue me and hanged up.
we just found out that collection agency was sending our bill for 3 years to an imaginary address. we never lived there.
we had first court but it was post poned becuase we brought evidence attorney did not have:
papers from school that kids went to school on aug 26.
papers from that imaginary address appartments that we never lived there.
very important document that we got from La mirada by chance. the records for 2000 which say that we moved out on aug 25 2000. not sep 14
like attorney states. I went to manager office and asked for my records for 2000. the lady did not know what was going on with me and appartments and printed the records. but when we officially requested records for 2000 appartments replied they did not have them.

their bill of damages is from some other place. those claims were rediculous: we had a 24'' by 30'' inch hole in a wall, doors are broken and etc. it was just rediculous. before we moved out we cleaned an appartment and there wasn't anything wrong anywhere.

basically this is what they are doing. appartments policy is that they destroy lease documents after 3 years. collection agency can only bug us for 6 years. so now we have no lease documents and no time or opportunity to refute them. Collection agency sent the bill to wrong address on purpose. because if we got the bill on time we could have easyly disputed it. he have numerious witnesses who saw our appartment after we moved out and it was alright. collection agency had our social security number and phone number. they must use SSN to find our address.

we contacted free consultants. they said that there is no law that collection agency or appartments broke.
this can't be right. this way anyone can extort from anyone.

http://www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fdcpa/fdcpact.htm
in this document section 807, number 11 states that collection agency
must communicate with us in writing. they never did. neither did the appartments. but the consultant to whom we showed the document said
that this act does not apply to our situation, because this act is only for depts collected within 14 days of filing to collection agency. sounds strange.

please help!
rippedOff
 
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Postby Aubergine » Mon Aug 14, 2006 11:20 pm

You posted in a New York City forum. There is a forum titled "General Discussion - beyond New York" where this should be posted.
Aubergine
 


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