Outstanding rent, landlord contacts me a year later

drumswan

bucketybuck wrote: »

You don't know what you are talking about.

There is no more a verbal contract here than the OP has with us for telling us all that she lived there.

I think Ill charge her rent myself. The fact that I am not actually her landlord seems neither here nor there with old Ray

LooksLikeRain

Ray Palmer wrote: »

You do realise the OP has acknowledged they lived there to this person now. A verbal contract stand in rental here.

Acknowledging the use of a service or product does not constitute a contract, and all the TandCs which go with any contract, and would not be adequate for any legal proceding. Legally, there needs to be an agreement which the landlord is claiming has not been honoured. It could easily be claimed that the OP thought the rent was €1 per month. It would appear that the landlord or their agent never had any contact before or during the tenacy with the tenant, therefore any claimed contract now is post the event which would not be enforcable.
Either way it is one persons word against another which no solicitor will bother taking to court.

WIZE

Ray Palmer wrote: »

You do realise the OP has acknowledged they lived there to this person now. A verbal contract stand in rental here.

But there was no agreement on what rent needs to be paid or T&C of an Agreement

The_Conductor

Now- what did I say about not attacking other posters........
Refute their post- without attacking them.
I swear I had less trouble keeping smacht in a lecture room of 40 students while giving statistics tutorials than I have here.

This is not the wild wild west. We have different opinions- it would be boring if we didn't. We don't go around tearing lumps out of one another though.

Regards

The_Conductor

LooksLikeRain

If morally you want to pay this rent you should request an invoice is sent to you from the landlords solicitor or accountant which states the purpose of the payment. As this is a rental payment the landlords PPS number would be required on the invoice.
You can also check the PRTB website to see if the tenacy was registered at the time and if it was not you should contact the PRTB. You could also bring a case to the PRTB for harassment if you feel the landlord is been unreasonable, even if the tenancy is was not registered.
You will also need the loandlords PPS number if you are entitled to a rent tax credit for that year.

LooksLikeRain

limerick85 wrote: »

try the prtb.ie website.they have some good info there but not sure if they could help you if you contacted them as you probably weren't registered with them.
the right thing to do would be to pay your way,but its a dog eat dog world these days and i wouldn't be giving him the steam off my p*ss

Even if the tenancy was not registered the PRTB it is the first route for any dispute. The landlord is legally responsible for registering the tenacy and will be fined for not registering. PRTB registration is not optional, it is a legal requirement.

gaius c

Koptain Liverpool wrote: »

You tell him Ray. Yes OP you're a big thief :p

I love the way Landlord Ray always appears on these threads championing the rights of poor landlords against thieving tenants.

The fact is the landlord was a complete idiot in not ensuring rent was being paid by tenants. He can't come looking for rent a year later. No court in Europe would back him up. Yopu'd be mad in the head to even consider paying this OP.

Easy tiger. We need different points of view on this forum and like it or not but Ray provides a 100% pro-landlord point of view and he's mostly well-informed about the business. Without it, this forum becomes a "yes forum" for tenants & accidental landlords.

runawaybishop

There are a hell of a lot of people suggesting that the OP just skip off with someone's rent money. Assuming the land lord is who he says he is the OP should just request an invoice from them, it'll have the info they need.

Lemming

IF the landlord is who they claim to be, and indeed did take ownership of the property during the tenancy, then yes, the OP owes some - if not all - of the rent in question and really should pay what they owe.

But that said and done, there's quite a few questions around the above as it stands, and I find it incredulous that some posters seem to think that a random email out of the blue should be enough to hand over any sum of cash without question. An invoice would take care of most of the details and rule out someone taking the p*ss most likely; but there is still the outstanding question of whether or not the OP owes rent money to this landlord, or the previous landlord, or a combination of the two.

Maria.34

Wow, thank you guys so much for all the information Everything in this thread can be found it seems, from me being a thief, to the landlords has no legal rights at all.

Anyway, it seems this thread got someone interested who actually has legal experience. After sending him a more detailed explanation, this is the answer I received.

From a legal standpoint, your landlord cannot demand any outstanding rent from you, because he failed to supply you with any sort of verbal or written contract. It is a landlords duty to follow up on his tenants when moving in, supply them with a legal contract and register them with PRTB.

Your landlord has also failed to register you with PRTB. Landlords are legally obliged to register all tenancies to which the Act applies. Failure to register a tenancy may result in a criminal conviction. The current fine is up to €4,000 and or 6 months imprisonment. In other words, your landlord could be fined for up to €4,000 for not registering you with PRTB.

You also mentioned that he claimed to have forwarded this issue to his solicitor. You most likely won't hear from any solicitor, because there is no legal ground to support any of his demands.

Regarding holding the deposit of a current tenant, that is renting another room. You stated that each room is being let separately, with individual contracts. The landlord has no legal rights to hold another tenants deposit on grounds of your outstanding rent. The tenant in question should make a phone call to PRTB, to have this matter solved.

Bottom line, legally speaking, you don't owe the landlord any outstanding rent and he may not legally demand any money from you. On top of that, your landlord may be fined up to €4,000 for not registering you or the other tenants with PRTB.

From a moral perspective, I would do the right thing and pay the outstanding rent. Before making any payment, please verify that he is indeed the owner of the property in question during the time of your stay. Make sure you receive the following information before making any transaction.

- Full name and address of the landlord
- PPS number of the landlord
- Copy of a photo ID of the landlord
- Bank details that matches the full name of the landlord/owner.
- A signed contract, stating the address of the property, including the date of your stay.

If you are still in contact with any of the tenants living there, please ask them for the name and address of the landlord, to see if it matches.

I would strongly recommend that you also contact a 3rd party, such as Threshold or PRTB.

Your landlord might not agree to have PRTB look into this, since he never registered you, in which case your landlord would be summoned before the PRTB and most likely be fined.

It's a bit of a tricky situation for him, but this is not your problem.

Let me know if you need any further assistance.

Thank you very much to everyone for all the help. I guess my next step would be telling the landlord that I will make the payments, once I have received all the necessary details. I'll also see what he says about contacting PRTB.

Ray Palmer

LooksLikeRain wrote: »

Acknowledging the use of a service or product does not constitute a contract, and all the TandCs which go with any contract, and would not be adequate for any legal proceding. Legally, there needs to be an agreement which the landlord is claiming has not been honoured. It could easily be claimed that the OP thought the rent was €1 per month. It would appear that the landlord or their agent never had any contact before or during the tenacy with the tenant, therefore any claimed contract now is post the event which would not be enforcable.
Either way it is one persons word against another which no solicitor will bother taking to court.

Section 4 applies without any written agreement. They are T&C. All the LL has to do is prove what the agreement was prior and after. You think any judge is going to believe the rent should be €1 a month. A solicitor will send a letter no problem and the claim can be made in both PRTB and small claims.

This is just playing silly beggars the OP owes the rent and to not pay it is theft of service. The only issue is proof this is the LL which does not require a contract.

Frank Black

You should print out his email, set fire to it, take a photo and email it back.

D3PO

Maria.34 wrote: »

Anyway, it seems this thread got someone interested who actually has legal experience. After sending him a more detailed explanation, this is the answer I received.


.

I can tell you from reading that the person who sent it to you has no legal experience just form the verbiage used. Im not saying all or even any of what they say is incorrect but they certainly have no legal experience.

Ray Palmer

Maria.34 wrote: »

Anyway, it seems this thread got someone interested who actually has legal experience. After sending him a more detailed explanation, this is the answer I received.
.

The bit about fines from PRTB is very questionable. The sent out 25000 letters and fined 25 people in the past. What they can do and what they will do are not the same thing. It is wishful think to assume the maximum fine is given each time.

I took over a property that was not PRTB registered and they fined my aunt zero for not being registered just asked her to pay the amounts she should have. This is the most likely thing they do with everybody.

Maria.34

Ray Palmer wrote: »

Section 4 applies without any written agreement. They are T&C. All the LL has to do is prove what the agreement was prior and after. You think any judge is going to believe the rent should be €1 a month. A solicitor will send a letter no problem and the claim can be made in both PRTB and small claims.

This is just playing silly beggars the OP owes the rent and to not pay it is theft of service. The only issue is proof this is the LL which does not require a contract.

You are forgetting that I have never met, talked to, or seen the landlord. So not even a verbal contract was made.

But as I said, I'm fully aware that the right thing to do is to pay the rent.

beauf

Ray Palmer wrote: »

... A solicitor will send a letter no problem and the claim can be made in both PRTB and small claims.

This is just playing silly beggars the OP owes the rent and to not pay it is theft of service. The only issue is proof this is the LL which does not require a contract.

Where will he send the letter to?

How is the small claims court relevant?

How will the OP pay the LL and know its not a scam by some third party?

http://www.courts.ie/courts.ie/library3.nsf/pagecurrentweblookuptopnav/small%20claims%20procedure

Maria.34 wrote: »

... I guess my next step would be telling the landlord that I will make the payments, once I have received all the necessary details. I'll also see what he says about contacting PRTB.

Be interesting to see will he send all the details...

Pawwed Rig

From the posts in this thread I think Maria has done everything correctly so calling her a thief is very unfair. She acknowledges that she lived in the house and acknowledges that she owes rent. A request for the Landlord to prove who he is before she hands over €1,000 is perfectly reasonable.
I would be concerned as to who the money is actually owed to. If the landlord did not have legal title to the property during the 60 days Maria spend in the property then the rent is owed to the previous owner and not the current one. The actual owner of the property during the tenancy needs to be ascertained.
The methods the guy is using to collect the money are abrasive. I would be annoyed to have received a communication like that in the form of a threat.
A solicitor has no standing here as it must go before the PRTB if the OP is disputing it. Any determination is completely unenforceable once the former tenant is not resident in Ireland.
So, I agree that Maria should pay (as does she from her posts) but the LL should realise that if she does it will because she wants to and not because she has to so I would suggest a dramatic change in tone from any future correspondence.

SpaceTime

Maria also needs to check to see if the landlord is living in Ireland, as if he's resident overseas, she's also supposed to withhold part of the rent and pay it to Revenue.

If there's no contract - there's no contract.

Not her problem. The landlord needs to read a few books on basic contract law. It's not very complicated really.

The landlord is trying to collect rent, retrospectively from someone who is not in the country, who he has never met and has no contract with and he's doing this by email and refusing to provide any further details of his ownership of the property and identity !?!

I mean, that's just like if I decided to e-mail some random person on this forum and demand payment for something. You'd rightly tell me to get knotted.

I would also have my doubts that he has a solicitor involved at all. Solicitors tend to know how 'law' works.

beauf

SpaceTime wrote: »

...Solicitors tend to know how 'law' works.

You'd hope....

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/courts/woman-tells-of-horror-after-house-put-in-solicitors-name-29652940.html

matrim

There is the question of who she actually legally owes the rent to. As others have mentioned, when did the new landlord take possession of the property.

There is also the case that in many rental situations such as the one she describes, she would actually be subletting the property from one of the other tenants and then technically she would owe the money to the other tenant and not the landlord.

You would need to verify what the contract for the whole house was at the time or was it a contract per room

No Pants

I'm confused as to what difference the "landlord" thinks the solicitor is going to make as it's not like the OP is going to receive a letter from the solicitor, go "okay then" and just pay up. The first thing you would ask a solicitor for is proof and I assume that the solicitor would also ask for proof before taking any action. If it goes to court, the OP would still need to see some proof and so would the court.

beauf

I don't thing the solicitor has any remit until after they go to the PRTB anyway. The LL can avoid all that by giving the OP their proper details.

SpaceTime

If the OP isn't named on the lease, there's not much the PRTB could do either.

I mean, at that rate anyone could take anyone to the PRTB over alleged unpaid rent.

If the OP feels a moral obligation to pay rent she believes she owes, that's fine. But I can't see how the landlord thinks he has any legal relationship with her.

This is why I think people should really educate themselves before becoming a landlord. There are too many people completely unaware of the most basic legal principles.

beauf

Does the op not have a verbal agreement. The OP confimed this in their email reply. If the OP had not replied to the email, or had left no contact details. Then you might have a point.

A landlord in Ireland is the owner of land or a building owner who has leased that land, building or a part of the land or building, to another person. The person a landlord rents this land or building to, is called a ‘tenant’. Your rights and obligations as a landlord in Ireland come from specific landlord/tenant law. In addition, your rights and obligations stem from any written or verbal tenancy agreement between you and your tenant. Leases or other tenancy agreements cannot take away from your or your tenants’ legal rights. However, you and your tenant can agree on matters that are not dealt with in law.

No Pants

At no point has the OP indicated that she doesn't want to pay. But she needs to make sure that the payment reaches the correct party. So if she pays this new landlord, she would need to receive some kind of indemnity from the old landlord to prevent him or anyone else chasing her for money at a later date. This is in addition to the new landlord proving his identity and any rights that he has to the property. Otherwise, it's no different to any request for cash received via email.

bucketybuck

beauf wrote: »

The op had a verbal agreement. The OP confimed this in their email reply.

How can she have a verbal agreement with somebody she has never met nor spoken to?

SpaceTime

Also verbal agreements are not easy to prove in court and are generally considered a very bad idea for any kind of contract involving significant amounts of money, provision of services, goods etc like this.

Short of having a recorded conversation, they can be quite useless as it'll come down to a complete mess if there are no witnesses to it and it would just be one party's word against the other's.

You can't enter a contract without being aware that you've entered a contract either. Nor can a contract be made up retrospectively.

So, basically as far as I can see based on what the OP has said anyway, no contract would appear to exist.

Based on what some people are arguing here you could retrospectively charge a house guest rent, which is not the case in law.

No Pants

bucketybuck wrote: »

How can she have a verbal agreement with somebody she has never met nor spoken to?

The new landlord would have to furnish her with some written agreement from the old landlord that ownership of her rental agreement passed to him.

Don't know why, but I'm having awful trouble spelling the word landlord this morning.

Pawwed Rig

SpaceTime wrote: »

You can't enter a contract without being aware that you've entered a contract either. Nor can a contract be made up retrospectively.

So, basically as far as I can see based on what the OP has said anyway, no contract would appear to exist.

The Op was aware they were entering a contract for €500 per month and she acknowledges this. The question is more about who this contract is with.

SpaceTime

The landlord's really not doing himself any favours by taking such a hostile stance on it if the OP's actually willing to pay anyway!

Totally counterproductive.

I mean, there's no dispute at all. She just wants to prove he's not some kind of scam artist.

It's perfectly reasonable to expect some kind of proof of ownership and identity before paying over that kind of money.