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| Monday, March 10, 2008 |
| If the rent is too good to be true... |
The City Edition of the Boston Globe ran this story this weekend: Foreclosing costs about an immigrant family facing eviction from their East Boston apartment. As Ma told the tale, it was those two against a crew of brawny men who, late on a Monday morning in early January, were methodically cleaning out her family's East Boston apartment, from furniture to food.
She rushed into her bedroom and began jamming her valuables inside a big black pocketbook: necklace and bracelet, green cards and passports, and $3,000 in cash the family of four had squirreled away.
At some point, she realized the unfamiliar men were not there to steal her possessions, she recounted through an interpreter.
They wanted to take her very home.
Sobbing, Ma instinctively pleaded with the men in Chinese: "I pay my rent. Why are you forcing me to move out?"
But the band of workers was not Asian, and didn't understand. One of the men, who had earlier tugged on her sleeve, she said, was now pushing her out the door.
Ma dug the heels of her black leather work shoes into the kitchen's vinyl floor. But she was no match for the man, or the force behind him - the unrelenting fury of a foreclosure that was sweeping her away. The plight of renters being forced out after their landlord is foreclosed has been discussed in previous posts. What I found interesting in this story was first, the vivid descriptions and second, the amount of rent this family was paying for a two bedroom apartment in Boston!
To the end, Ma said, she had faithfully been paying $500 rent in person for the two-bedroom to the owner who lived on the second floor, lesser amounts if she handed it in early.
I know the apartment is in East Boston (which traditionally is a more affordable area) - but still, that is dirt cheap unsubsidized rent. As in, if you are paying that little for rent, something is wrong. |
| posted by Boston Gal @ 11:32 AM *
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My landlord started going through foreclosure back in November. I found out when the gas company informed me she owed $3000 in gas bills & letters for the bank. The management company she hired also told me not to pay them any more since the landlord stopped paying them also. I took over the gas bill (only had to pay 3 month worth of gas ($200)) and stopped paying rent. I'm still living rent free (though I do have a placed lined up in July). I have not heard from the landlord.
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My landlord started going through foreclosure back in November. I found out when the gas company informed me she owed $3000 in gas bills & letters for the bank. The management company she hired also told me not to pay them any more since the landlord stopped paying them also. I took over the gas bill (only had to pay 3 month worth of gas ($200)) and stopped paying rent. I'm still living rent free (though I do have a placed lined up in July). I have not heard from the landlord.