Renter's Rights On Foreclosure House In Santa Monica, CA

[Sfisch27]

My question involves a foreclosure in the State of: California

My husband and I rent a house that is being foreclosed. Our lease took effect in July 2006 and is good through July 31, 2008 (we signed an extension in January not knowing the owners were delinquent). We came home to a note on the door yesterday indicating that the house will be up for Public Sale on June 2. How will this effect us?

I became aware of the situation when I had found an ad back in February on Craigs List for the house we were living in!!! Apparently, the bank was not aware that we had a signed lease extension through July and our landlords were stillt he owner's of the house at the time we signed the extension. The owners of the house are delinquent over $35k, clearly our rent has not gone to paying their mortgage (that would be 1 1/2 years worth of rent).

Can we recoup any past rent? Also, how do we handle the timing of the sale vs our lease expiration? We hate to move before our lease ends. We also hate to line our landlords pockets. All of the utilities are in our name.

Lastly, we are concerned we will not get our security deposit back, which is $200 more than our very expensive rent. Can we withhold paying last month's rent in the event we never see our deposit again?

Any insight would be wonderful, thank you very much!

[panther10758]

California rent regulations can be found here