Check this out ...

[ezdriver]

Not sure where to post this so I decided this was as appropriate as any.

Today I was home all day chillin. I went out to check my mail. A car pulls up to my driveway. Guys gets out and asked if I was Mr. X. No sir ... that would be the owner of this house and I am the tenant and have been for a while. He served me a copy of foreclosure papers from Citibank.

The owner has been collecting my rent for three years and had stopped paying the mortgage for the last two years.

By the way, I did not rent the house directly from the owners. In fact, I have never met the owners. I rented the house from a property management company.

Also, I just ordered a new home from my employer [a national home builder]. It takes 5 months to build it.

What should I do about my rent?

[guiness56]

What state are you in?

AFAIK, you are still legally liable to pay your rent until told you need to move.

How much time they give you is dependent on your state.

[credit-hunter]

hopefully you have free rent for 5 months ..lol

[ezdriver]

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@guiness56 wrote:

What state are you in?

AFAIK, you are still legally liable to pay your rent until told you need to move.

How much time they give you is dependent on your state.

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I'm in Florida.

When I called the property management company to tell them what happened, they were shocked to hear it.

[Shogun]

I agree.  The foreclosure is between the owner and the bank.  The rent is between you and the property management.  I would take that paperwork that was served to you to them.

[Shogun]

There was some posts inbetween me and guiness.  I would still pay the rent.

[gdale6]

You will still have to pay the rent though I find this repugnant, the owner has been stealing for years.

[ezdriver]

The loan officer for my purchase is telling me to not pay any more rent until I receive written notice from the owner, the property manager or Citibank. What do you suppose that Citibank will say if I contact them? The fact that the papers were being serived to the home owners at my address tells me that Citibank likely did not know that the house was non-owner-occupied.

Can the property management company force me to pay rent on a house that is in foreclosure?

I signed for the two copies [one for me and another for my wife] as TENANT so Citibank will now know that the owner does not live at my address. What do you suppose they will do?

[rwt]

Tis happened to one of my friends in Michigan and he stopped paying rent to the landlord. I want to say he lived in the house for 8 months after the fact.

[ezdriver]

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@Shogun wrote:

There was some posts inbetween me and guiness.  I would still pay the rent.

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Would you do it because of wanting to remain in compliance with the lease or because you feel that it is the right thing to do? I'm more interested in legal rights and obligations of a tenant in this situation. I have had three friends of mine that did not know the house they were renting was being foreclosed until they received an eviction notice from the lender. The process server told me today that the courts have started to notify tenants as too many tenants were caught off guard with eviction notices.