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My first and second case were related. My first case was my landlord withheld my security deposit when I was in college after junior year. I really needed the m

by aynyc 2y ago

My first and second case were related. My first case was my landlord withheld my security deposit when I was in college after junior year. I really needed the money so I threatened to sue (my college had legal help). He relented but decided to deduct BS charges. I went to the small claim court and filed everything properly with pictures and documentations. I think I paid the sheriff $25 to serve the paper. My landlord never showed up, won by default and got all my money back. If I remember correctly, I got my filing/serving fee back as well. Here comes the second case. So I won, yay! He still refused to pay, so I went back to court again. This part was a bit hazy as I had the help of a law student at that time. If I remember correctly, I had to provide information to the court enforcement officer (a local sheriff) where to execute the collection. Since I knew my landlord's bank and workplace, it was easy. He had 2 options: property/asset seizure or wage garnish. He paid up immediately after the sheriff went to his work. I'm pretty sure I got all my money back including the fee the sheriff charges (I vaguely remember they get x percentage of the claim and gas miles?). My third case was for eviction from my parents' old house. The renter didn't pay rent and got evicted. Broke many things on the way out. I knew small claim court limit was $5K, and it barely covered the cost of repair. But filing lawsuit in civil court was too big for me to handle and lawyers weren't really interested in that. Anyway, same process as before, carefully document everything. Won the case easily. Sheriff garnished his wage. I only got about $1K before he skipped town. Not that I care about it anymore, but the judgement is still out there against him. To be clear, each case took forever. 60-90 days. Be patient, get what's rightly yours. In some ways, I have a lot of respect for our court system because of my experience. It's a hard job, but play by the rules and you probably will come out on top.

doctorpangloss 2y ago
The security deposits are interesting. It would seem, if you had to use the legal system to merely get what you were owed, it was a net negative economically, right? The eviction "barely covered the cost of repair" so it was also nonetheless a net negative. It's tough. You are answering the question. I don't know anyone who has had a net positive economic outcome from the courts.
- shoo 2y ago
  > if you had to use the legal system to merely get what you were owed, it was a net negative economically, right? It depends how you anchor things. If you anchor to the amount you expected to recover assuming a hypothetical alternate reality where the landlord returns the amount of bond money you are lawfully owed, then it may feel as a net negative. If you reframe the situation conditioned on observing the realised reality -- featuring a landlord who is not behaving as they are "ought" to, but are actually deducting BS charges, a more useful anchor would be to compare against the benchmark of "how much could you reasonably expect to recover, given the actual reality we're observed to be in, by the next best alternative to using the legal system". One simple alternative to the legal system is to do nothing and let it go, resulting in recovery of 0% of the disputed value. Another alternative could be engaging a collection agency, who might be willing to buy the debt at a significant mark down from face value, in exchange for accepting the risk that they may not be able to collect. Yet another alternative could be a DIY approach where you get a bunch of mates with baseball bats to advocate on your behalf. Recovering 20% of a debt net legal expenses through the legal system is a huge improvement over recovering 0% of a debt if the alternative is doing nothing and accepting 0% recovery.
- aynyc 2y ago
  I think your view is a bit odd in a sense that, average people don't go to court to gain or create economically values. Ignoring the headline ambulance chasing case here, there usually is an injured party to a transaction. In my case, if I didn't go to court, then I wouldn't have gotten anything back, so that's a negative economical outcome to me. In theory, I should get my security deposit back promptly and tenants should pay rent on time. But in reality, that's just not the case. Court is the only mechanism that we have that give us the authority to take back what's ours legally. But it also creates a guard rail to forces bad actors to behave better.

by aynyc 2y ago

doctorpangloss 2y ago

The security deposits are interesting. It would seem, if you had to use the legal system to merely get what you were owed, it was a net negative economically, right? The eviction "barely covered the cost of repair" so it was also nonetheless a net negative. It's tough. You are answering the question. I don't know anyone who has had a net positive economic outcome from the courts.

shoo 2y ago
> if you had to use the legal system to merely get what you were owed, it was a net negative economically, right? It depends how you anchor things. If you anchor to the amount you expected to recover assuming a hypothetical alternate reality where the landlord returns the amount of bond money you are lawfully owed, then it may feel as a net negative. If you reframe the situation conditioned on observing the realised reality -- featuring a landlord who is not behaving as they are "ought" to, but are actually deducting BS charges, a more useful anchor would be to compare against the benchmark of "how much could you reasonably expect to recover, given the actual reality we're observed to be in, by the next best alternative to using the legal system". One simple alternative to the legal system is to do nothing and let it go, resulting in recovery of 0% of the disputed value. Another alternative could be engaging a collection agency, who might be willing to buy the debt at a significant mark down from face value, in exchange for accepting the risk that they may not be able to collect. Yet another alternative could be a DIY approach where you get a bunch of mates with baseball bats to advocate on your behalf. Recovering 20% of a debt net legal expenses through the legal system is a huge improvement over recovering 0% of a debt if the alternative is doing nothing and accepting 0% recovery.
aynyc 2y ago
I think your view is a bit odd in a sense that, average people don't go to court to gain or create economically values. Ignoring the headline ambulance chasing case here, there usually is an injured party to a transaction. In my case, if I didn't go to court, then I wouldn't have gotten anything back, so that's a negative economical outcome to me. In theory, I should get my security deposit back promptly and tenants should pay rent on time. But in reality, that's just not the case. Court is the only mechanism that we have that give us the authority to take back what's ours legally. But it also creates a guard rail to forces bad actors to behave better.