Posted on 02/05/2009 4:26:17 AM PST by SES1066
The ex-husband of a woman shot dead in a Christmas Eve massacre has been asked to pay her rent.
Her landlord claims Alicia Ortiz broke her lease and gave 'insufficient notice to vacate' before she was killed.
...
Her landlord, Broadcrest Foothill Apartment Homes, told Ortiz's former husband, Carlos, that he owes $2,821 in rent and penalties.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
sounds cold but
her estate is required to pay her outstanding debts
including her lease
no story here
I beg to differ - Landlord is suing divorced husband, not her estate. Nothing is said about him being the estate executor though that may be this case. You do have a point in which this is a case of lousy reporting!
Unless he was still on the lease (how “ex” was the ex-husband?), I don’t think he’s on the hook.
Wait - was this rent she owed at the time of her death? Or are they charging that she because she was killed, they consider that ‘insufficient notice’??? If so, how rude of her not to tell the apartment manager that she was going to be shot to death on Christmas Eve!
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They’ll drop it after word gets out. But seriously, some things just scream for a beat down.
The writer, in his drunken stupor, did manage to mention the name “Carlos” one time but still this story has all the clarity of having been written by a crack ho on a binge.
No wonder the Lame Stream Media is dying. They’re not only stupid and liberal... they’re just plain stupid.
Yeah, she didn't even have the decency to text them from the morgue. :-/
Sorry, but when you are dead, you personally stop accruing debt.
Ditto for a mortgage or any other debt accrued.
Unless stated in contract, the death of a debtor does not discharge their debt, plus interest on the unpaid debt as per terms of the debt.
Estates go to probate or are assigned executors,
so that estates can be inventoried, assets valued, and debts can be paid from the estate before remaining assets are divided among inheritors.
If she died insolvent, then the lease remainder may not be paid but a court would have to hear from the executor and so rule.
This all sounds very cold but anyone whose loved one has died for any reason, no matter how tragically, has to confront this sooner or later.
We do not know from this story how responsible her ex husband is for her debts, per the terms of the divorce, wills, life insurance or other assets jointly held, etc
Sorry, but that won't stand up in court. She died near the end of the month. The landlord cannot demand rent for the next month. He can also not demand the penalty for breaking her lease.
Why?
She cannot accrue debt when she is dead.
Now, the landlord can demand her estate vacate the rental property within 30 days of her death, or face penalties.
But there is no lease, is no contract, is no accrual of debt after the point of her death.
AOL in the past has tried this nonsense. They claim that the account is still active because it was never canceled. The only catch is, only the account holder can cancel the account according to the AOL terms of service.
In that case, they claim, the account can never be broken upon the death of the account holder and debt continues to accrue.
Thrown out of court in every instance. You cannot accrue death or be penalized for breaking a contract, lease or account once you are dead.
But is the ex-husband the beneficiary of the estate? He is not personally responsible for her debts.
Off the point, but I thought that there were no guns in Britain.
Very true ASB, but what you meant to say was:
You cannot accrue debt or be penalized for breaking a contract, lease or account once you are dead.
Go get some caffeine.
LOL! How sadly true!
This was the California Christmas massacre. Brits are reporting what American media is too lazy to report.
“AOL in the past has tried this nonsense”
you are confusing month-to-month debt for a “service”, with a long term contractual financial obligation for goods and services received by the debtor.
You and I have no idea if her lease was month-to-month or longer term. The amount of the suit suggests a very modest attempt to collect final rent due in her lease contract, and whatever other financial sum was required in the event of no-notice lease abrogation.
The law MOST LIKELY does not recognize the involuntary (and tragic) cause of the abrogation- just the abrogation and the financial damage done to the landlord if the contract to him is not paid.
Property contracts almost always contain a clause binding the tenant AND/OR THEIR HEIRS/ASSIGNs to pay. This is how leases and mortages work. Check your own. You might want to up your life insurance.
Have you ever probated an estate?
If you know a state and judge in the US who automatically discharge mortage debt, lease debt, car debt, medical bills and income taxes (yes you owe IRS taxes for the full year even if you die on January 1st) when the debtor dies, without even going through the proccess of getting the estate to pay off the debts, please let us know,
we have no idea of who is her heirs and who is the executor of her estate
this story is just an attenmpt to jerk tears about how unfair it is that a dead person’s debts must be paid
in this case, a person who died tragically and notoriously
but a lot of us have been through probating estates of people we love- dead is dead and debts are debts that must be repaid (if the estate has means) unless a court discharges them
You are right. More class envy from the MSM. Landlord = bad. Right out of Marx’s playbook and Freepers are falling for it.
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