Can You Get Sued for Rent and Damages If You Weren't a Tenant

**bigcitygirl** · 06-30-2012, 11:11 PM

My question involves landlord-tenant law in the State of: Maryland

I am going to make a long story short, hopefully. There was this woman, lets call her N for now, I was the live in nanny for N for 2 years, N is a little cookoo in the head, and I ended up finding a new job. She apologized up and down, we remained in contact since then in a very friendly way, I sometimes came over for dinner, came to play with the kids etc etc etc. Fast forward 2 years until this Janurary I lost my live in nanny job, N offers to let me come live in her house and have some use of her car while I get a real job and work on school, in exchange for her help, I clean her house. From the very beginning this was not a good idea, shes very anal about things and finds things i missed in the weirdest of places, I admit to making small mistakes (like missing some dust under the cable box). She would go off on me and be almost verbally abusive to me about it.

In addition to the full housecleaning I did (which took me about 10 hours in a day to do) I did other things for her, such as laundry, cleaning the kitty litter boxes daily, making sure dishes were done daily, if i saw clothes that needed putting away, I would, occasional babysitting, errands etc etc etc.. NOne of this was ever enough for her, nothing I did could please her, she kept threatening to kick me out. Very scary for a college student working on minimum wage. One day my friend had enough of her constant threat of homlessness so she agreed to let me stay at her house for a bit until i can get back to the state my family lives.

I told them I would be moving by the end of the weekend (i told her June 22 and moved out on June 24th). I only lived there 6 months. The entire time i lived there I was still living out of boxes because theyd never emptied out the spare room for me to put my things. They were very nice about it and said if I needed anything at all, dont hesitate to ask. Now N knew I was selling some things to try to get some money to get home. She had a coworker looking to buy a wii and I was selling one. She agreed to sell it to her coworker for me, I was supposed to stop back by on monday june 25 and get the money from her and a few things i left behind. She ignored my calls all day monday so I just stopped by. I got the couple things I forgot, and gave her the key back, and asked her for the money, she claims she forgot to take the wii with her to work. I was fine with that and asked if she could run the money by my work on thursday, she said that was fine. She never showed up. I tried calling her for 3 days and she ignored my calls, until my friend left a message saying that I needed the money to get home, please call us or we will try and stop by.

Suddenly this flood of nasty text messages comes in saying I owe her for living in her house for 6 months, that the room was a mess and she has to hire someone to clean it (not true), and that I ruined the bed sheets (not true). She said I was not allowed on her property and If I came over they would call the cops and have me escorted off the property.

So of course we go over there, I stayed in the car though and as soon as my friend got out of the car N came out of the house. My friend was nice as pie to her, but N began shouting at her and calling her names and took off in a car with someone else. We know her husband is still inside, we call the cops ourselves to get assistance in either getting the money or the wii back. Husband claims he has no idea where his wife went or where the wii is. Cop asks for peaceful resolution and he said hed have N call me. Cop pulls me asside and advises me not to call her anymore but to write her one email asking for my items back and if she didnt respond, take it to civil court. When I got home I wrote her the following email:

As Advised by the Baltimore County Police department, I am writing to
you to try and get my personal property (listed below) or the agreed
upon money ($75) back as we had originally agreed verbally on Sunday
June 24, 2012. You originally agreed to have money for me on Monday
June 25th 2012, but you didn't and agreed to bring it to me work on
Thursday June 28, 2012, again you didn't show. All I would like is my
items back or the money for them. Please advise me when I can either
get the money or the items back by Wednesday July 4th or I will be
filing a civil suit for the retail value of the items as advised by
the officer who came by to assist in getting my items back.

Items:
Wii: $139.00
Babysitting Mama Game $19.99
Wii Remote Plus: $39.99
Wii Nunchuck - White: $19.99
Wii Guitar: $29.99
Wii Bag w/ Game Case: $34.99
Extra Wii Power Supply: $29.99
Extra Wii AV Cords: $24.99
Extra Wii Sensor Bar: $14.99
White Wii Microphone: $19.99
Black Wii Microphone: $19.99

The comes the flood of texts later berating me, telling me I am a free loader with entitlement issues, that my mom is trashy, no wonder i turned out how I did, i am a parasite etc etc etc, and finally after her texting me for nearly an hour she said her husband would drop off the wii at my work on monday or tuesday. Then she says I'll see you in court for 6 months of back rent (Technically lived there 5 monthes but whatever).

Can she sue me for back rent?! I did so much for her, we didn't have a rental agreement because I wasn't supposed to be paying her rent! I was busting my butt around her house doing stuff she didn't appreciate and now that shes not satisfied she wants to sue a poor college student?

**aardvarc** · 06-30-2012, 11:51 PM

Anyone can try to sue for anything. The burden will be on her to prove to the judge that there was a rental agreement for X amount. Save the texts about your items she said she'd sell and didn't, and consider doing what the officer told you, and taking HER to court for the value of your items plus your court costs.

**bigcitygirl** · 07-01-2012, 01:45 PM

Now she responded to email with a bunch of lies. Telling me I shouldnt communicate with her or I will be filed harrasment on, am i allowed to respond to that email to defend myself? She saying I agreed to all this stuff like paying her for this and that but I never did. I dont want a non-response to look like I agreed to these things when I never did.

**aardvarc** · 07-01-2012, 05:39 PM

She's told you to stop communicating with her. You need to do exactly that. Your solution is to take her to court for the value of your items. She'll either file her own suit or she won't. Arguing with her at this point will get you nowhere but trouble. The only place where what she has to say will COUNT is in the courtroom.