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I've recently moved to a new city (in Oregon) with an idiot. I didn't really know they were an idiot until I moved in with them, but that's besides the point. When we initially moved in to the place, she opted to cover me for the first month's rent plus half the deposit, totaling approximately $1,000. Which she said was generous, and I'd be inclined to agree if she didn't immediately start hounding me about when I would pay her back, and how much money I was spending (not very much, and certainly not $1,000) on move in necessities, like basic furnishings, etc. I've yet to find work, and she knows this. I have no income as of now, but no matter how much I explain that to her, she seems to insist that I can somehow fabricate the money, or possibly that I'm holding out on her. She is not in any kind of dire situation. She's sitting on a few thousand, so I know this isn't some pressing need of hers, beyond her need to be in control. Yesterday, at about 3:00am, she sent me a "threatening" text about rent money, which is the only money I have, and which I've told her numerous times is going to the landlady as agreed in the lease, and that there's no risk of me not paying. I then awoke to find that she had taped a hand-written contract to my door. I haven't read it, and refuse to, because at this point, I'm tired of her petty belligerence, and paranoid accusations. She's responded by threatening legal action. She claims that she's willing to go to court over this. Now, as far as I'm aware, I actually have no obligation to pay her a dime. We made no written agreement about the initial move-in fees that she opted to cover, and at best, out of a sense of friendly co-operation, I might have told her I'd pay her back when I can. Which is certainly not now, as she should know. It doesn't seem to click. Beyond that, I don't believe she has a case. She can't prove that I've said anything, and in all our written communications, I can't find a single reference to debts owed or payments agreed to. So what I'd like to know is, what should I be doing? I mean, I don't think this threat is serious. She'll take me to court, I'm sure, but I don't think she has a case of any kind. Does that seem right? Should I be looking into some sort of defense? Any advice is appreciated. Edit: The landlady was present when my roommate paid the rent/deposit, and I can't remember if I said anything at that point about paying her back. I definitely don't think the landlady is going to want to be dragged to court over something this stupid, to testify that I made some kind of verbal agreement. Edit 2: Someone told me that I should tell my roommate that I will neither read or sign the contract without having a lawyer review it first, and that she would be responsible for the lawyer's bill. I don't know these things, is that normal? Is that even a real thing? Because it'd be great if it was. Danger-Pumpkin fucked around with this message at 02:47 on Nov 24, 2015 |
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Nov 24, 2015 02:34
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Sorry OP but you are the idiot and you owe her the money.
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Nov 24, 2015 04:47
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Okay.
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Nov 24, 2015 04:53
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Seriously I'd loving evict you. You agreed to move in and now refuse to pay rent. Unless you've got something in writing saying "you don't have to pay rent for the first month at all" and gave some consideration in return you're hosed. Jesus christ how are you this stupid.
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Nov 24, 2015 04:53
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I actually did pay rent. Rent is paid. Rent is not the issue.
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Nov 24, 2015 05:03
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Okay how about you loving owe someone money and think that them not being in immediate need of the money is an excuse not to repay it.
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Nov 24, 2015 05:13
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I think that me not having the money, or the means to acquire it is an excuse not to repay it immediately. Maybe I should clarify: I'm not trying to get out of repaying the money. The only reason I'm even thinking about the legal status of the arrangement is because she has threatened legal action. Which to me makes no sense, because what on earth would that accomplish? I have $50 to my name, and no job. I'll have even less once the electric bill shows up, which is in my name, and which she refuses to contribute to because of the debt. The only issue at all right now, is that she's insisted on making this an issue, despite knowing full and well that I'm not working yet, and can't pay the money back yet. There's simply no way. I mean, hell, SHE doesn't even have a job yet. So is it maybe, maybe just a little unreasonable for her to be considering taking me to court at this point? I mean, am I crazy for thinking that's unreasonable? Danger-Pumpkin fucked around with this message at 06:24 on Nov 24, 2015 |
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Nov 24, 2015 05:53
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Just so you know, you are the idiot here OP. hth.
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Nov 24, 2015 06:41
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The real goal in this situation is almost certainly to calm your roommate down and work out clear details about how you're going to repay the loan. She's probably freaking out that she loaned you, a stranger to them, a thousand dollars and agreed to live with you and then it turns out that you have no money to pay her back with and seemingly no prospects of getting any. They'd practically have to be a saint to not be freaking out in that circumstance. "I'll take you to court" isn't a great threat even if she backs it up and wins the case (what's a judge going to do, take your $50 and garnish your nonexistent wages?), but short of breaking your legs there's really nothing else available to try to motivate you to pay. The best thing to do is to sit down with your roommate and, in good faith, try to work out a specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound plan for you to get her the money that you both can agree to. If this is impossible for whatever reason, you can make each other miserable for the term of your lease and hopefully learn valuable lessons about the perils of loaning money to/accepting money from strangers.
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Nov 24, 2015 06:55
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Tao Jones posted:The real goal in this situation is almost certainly to calm your roommate down and work out clear details about how you're going to repay the loan. She's probably freaking out that she loaned you, a stranger to them, a thousand dollars and agreed to live with you and then it turns out that you have no money to pay her back with and seemingly no prospects of getting any. They'd practically have to be a saint to not be freaking out in that circumstance. I'm not actually a stranger. We've been friends for two years. Good friends, I had thought. Otherwise, I'd more or less understand the panic. And I agree that talking it over is the ideal path forward, because I don't really want to be stabbing each other in the back for six months, or whatever. She hasn't made that a terribly strong possibility, what with the suddenness and belligerence of the situation. I mean this essentially just popped up out of nowhere two days ago, and immediately escalated to vague threats of using *powers against me, and then this legal action biz this morning. So I'll give it a shot, but I'm not expecting I'll make much headway in calming her down, which I fear will just mean I get yelled at again. Thanks for the advice, Tao Jones. *She didn't explain the powers. She just said she would use all of the powers available to her. I assume she meant legal powers, but I'm not ruling out witchcraft.
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Nov 24, 2015 07:08
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Sorry about your friend. (I got the impression from your post that you didn't know them previous to being roommates, but I think my advice would be the same even knowing that.) In the event of the worst, remember that wearing your clothes inside out will ward off the hexes of a Daughter of Circe, but such measures are powerless against the magicks of the Grey College. If you get turned into  please report back.
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Nov 24, 2015 07:40
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I did not get turned into a frog. But the conversation went about as well as I expected it to, since she started it by pounding on my door, and yelling at me. She is not calm. And now I'm not either. No progress has been made, save that she was crying by the end of *it, and swore that if she could figure out a way to move out without breaking the lease in a bad way, she was leaving. Which at this point, I'm super happy to hear. I don't think we're going to court, though. At least not anytime soon. Somewhere in the awful argument, I told her that as soon as I was working, she'd be getting paid back, and that no amount of fussing at me or threatening me was going to speed up that process, and if she didn't trust me, that was her problem. So I don't know. I have a headache, but really, nothing about my situation has changed as of this evening, except now my roommate know how angry I am at her in general, and there may not be a court thing. Maybe. *Because I guess I was too mean and rude. Which I absolutely was, and regret, but I'm sick of getting shouted at, so it just kind of happened.
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Nov 24, 2015 12:22
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Get a job and pay your friend back. Also if you were your friend posting here everyone would be saying "lol you gave $1000 to a deadbeat unemployed friend and actually expect you'll ever see it again?"
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Nov 24, 2015 18:01
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Baronjutter posted:Get a job and pay your friend back.
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Nov 24, 2015 18:52
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Just so we're clear, you decided to move to a completely new city while broke and without a job with a person you were more than happy to allow to cover your rear end and are now shocked that she's asking for her money from the dead beat, lovely friend she made a terrible mistake with? Stop posting on an internet forum and use that time to literally apply for any job that is handing out applications.
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Nov 24, 2015 19:08
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Danger-Pumpkin posted:I think that me not having the money, or the means to acquire it is an excuse not to repay it immediately. that you haven't started work and aren't showing any momentum on that front is the exact reason for her to need to get paid right loving now, rather than waiting around for your slack rear end to blow the rest of whatever savings you've got in the hopes she'll just like forget about the money you owe her or something. I don't really understand why she's moving, and not you, the jobless parasite, but I hope she lands on her feet and this will not be too painful a lesson for her in what generosity towards idiots gets you. If you put her on the line I'd be happy to resolve your whole issue by offering her some advice in extracting funds (or, at least, a deadbeat-free place of residence) from deadbeats like you, while small claims is an option you seem cowardly and shiftless and could probably be motivated to cough up with simpler incentives. A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 19:30 on Nov 24, 2015 |
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Nov 24, 2015 19:23
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Danger-Pumpkin posted:I think that me not having the money, or the means to acquire it is an excuse not to repay it immediately. Goddamn, you're right. Your bad decisions are everyone else's responsibility. See everyone, this is what Tumblr makes people believe. I hope you're happy, Internet.
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Nov 24, 2015 20:24
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Who the gently caress rents to two people with no job? And who the gently caress moves into an apartment with no job and no savings, no way to pay rent?
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Nov 24, 2015 20:45
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I dunno I think the chick is dumb for covering the money, why did she do that if she was going to freak out? Has something happened that she suddenly needs this money now? It just doesn't make a ton of sense why she's freaking the gently caress out suddenly when she offered to pay the money. Crazy people be crazy.
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Nov 25, 2015 05:12
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Miranda posted:I dunno I think the chick is dumb for covering the money, why did she do that if she was going to freak out? Has something happened that she suddenly needs this money now? It just doesn't make a ton of sense why she's freaking the gently caress out suddenly when she offered to pay the money. Crazy people be crazy. Pretty much. If this was going to be an issue for her, why do me the favor in the first place? When I asked her why this was suddenly so pressing during the argument, she didn't really have an answer. She said something about student loans being due in two years. Which, if that was such a pressing concern, I'm not sure why she agreed to this venture to begin with. She certainly hasn't been scrimping and saving any of the other several thousand dollars she's got. Also, people whining about me not having a job/being a bum and-or parasite: The whole reason I moved to THIS particular city was because of a job transfer that was %100 groovy, everyone was real happy to have me on board, etc, until I got here and it was suddenly revoked. I got a paycheck for it, for about $100. Despite that, I actually would have been able to pay my own way thus far, if my roommate hadn't reneged on her agreement to reimburse me for travel costs other than gas. I didn't choose to make an issue out of that at the time, because I thought we were friends, and that we could trust each other, and that it didn't matter as much as getting off to a harmonious start in a new place. My driving her vehicle here, packed with all of her stuff, saved her an estimate of over $4,000 in shipping. That's her price, that she quoted me. When this was brought up, suddenly the notion of a retroactive contract or agreement was not applicable, because it no longer stood to benefit her. I've been working on finding a job since I got here. Any job. I've been doing short term odd jobs to buy food and medicine with since. You can make a joke about prostitution if you wish. I assume the lot of you are all gainfully employed, and that that gainful employment was the result of walking outside and shouting "someone give me a job, please," until someone gave you a job.
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Nov 25, 2015 05:55
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Danger-Pumpkin posted:Pretty much. If this was going to be an issue for her, why do me the favor in the first place? When I asked her why this was suddenly so pressing during the argument, she didn't really have an answer. She said something about student loans being due in two years. Which, if that was such a pressing concern, I'm not sure why she agreed to this venture to begin with. She certainly hasn't been scrimping and saving any of the other several thousand dollars she's got. you're going to be homeless soon and you deserve it 
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Nov 25, 2015 06:05
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It's because I said groovy, isn't it?
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Nov 25, 2015 06:17
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Danger-Pumpkin posted:But the conversation went about as well as I expected it to, since she started it by pounding on my door, and yelling at me. Danger-Pumpkin posted:[...]until I got here and it was suddenly revoked. Wipfmetz fucked around with this message at 09:56 on Nov 25, 2015 |
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Nov 25, 2015 09:40
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It's true, your roommate is an imbecile. She'd have to be, to loan $1,000 to you. Does it occur to you that your roommate is freaking out and demanding some sort of payment immediately because she has no more than a couple thousand dollars to her name and she realizes she's likely to not see her thousand dollar interest-free loan back anytime soon, if ever? How about you go out and actually find a job so you can start paying her back. Multiple times in my life I have resorted to temp agencies, which have found me a job in less than a week. Alternatively, retail jobs are a dime a dozen. I take it it's been weeks since you borrowed the money and have moved into this apartment. What exactly are you doing with your time? Sucrose fucked around with this message at 11:08 on Nov 25, 2015 |
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Nov 25, 2015 11:05
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Sucrose posted:Does it occur to you that your roommate is freaking out and demanding some sort of payment immediately because she has no more than a couple thousand dollars to her name and she realizes she's likely to not see her thousand dollar interest-free loan back anytime soon, if ever? How about you go out and actually find a job so you can start paying her back. Multiple times in my life I have resorted to temp agencies, which have found me a job in less than a week. Alternatively, retail jobs are a dime a dozen. I take it it's been weeks since you borrowed the money and have moved into this apartment. Seriously, the OP needs to get income ASAP, any income. If you have $50 to your name, you should be freaking out and taking whatever job you can get your hands on. If you're concerned about some new job taking up all your time, preventing you from Sucrose posted:What exactly are you doing with your time? Judging by post history, an assload of gaming.
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Nov 25, 2015 13:30
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Dear lord! The person who loaned you $1000 wants to get paid back???!!!! What a bitch! Stop being such a loving failure, OP.
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Nov 25, 2015 16:58
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It's shopping season. Every retail place near where I live is hiring extra help.
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Nov 25, 2015 17:50
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Danger-Pumpkin posted:Pretty much. If this was going to be an issue for her, why do me the favor in the first place? Yeah, stupid bitch. Danger-Pumpkin posted:I assume the lot of you are all gainfully employed, and that that gainful employment was the result of walking outside and shouting "someone give me a job, please," until someone gave you a job. Its a good thing that company revoked their offer, because your attitude is below replacement-level. Some of us busted our asses when the opportunities weren't there, and waited tables, scheduled job hunting activities, interned for free, did temp work, stayed up late putting together resumes with work product, filled out applications, sent letters to local businesses asking about references, researching and planning. We worked hard to find work, and we knew that the world didn't owe us poo poo, and we were going to have to earn it ourselves. We didn't worry about what other people might have gotten handed to them, because other people's lives weren't our lives to live. We were happy for people who didn't have to struggle like we did. And we certainly didn't poo poo all over people who did us favors and helped us out. We were grateful, and apologetic, and we struggled with feeling helpless and feeling like a failure. And now we're thankful for our station in life, and we respect ourselves because we were forced to earn it. Now, we struggle with finding new and good ways to show our gratitude to the people who helped us and stood up for us, and finding ways to pay it forward. I'm telling you all this because (unless I guess your attitude changes) you will never experience the joy and pride that comes from real success. You will always look at people who have more than you do and be jealous and spiteful because you'll never perceive value in the things you have. Its really hard to get over here on the other side of the fence; thats why its so loving great.
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Nov 25, 2015 17:53
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Baronjutter posted:Get a job and pay your friend back. EDIT: To be less rude, it is pretty much that simple a lot of places during the holiday season. I worked at Target during the holidays a few years ago and openly laughed/cracked jokes with a guy about the anti-union video. I did what I was told and tried to look busy when I wasn't told what to do. They didn't even ask if I wanted to stay after, just assigned me hours after the holidays were over. That was a funny conversation from 300 miles away. UPS is probably flooding every job site looking for holiday help for their drivers too and they pay a decent amount over minimum wage. It's hard work, it's cold and you're probably going to have to put up with a grumpy rear end driver but it's a good temporary job while you apply elsewhere. But I'd be more than willing to bet if you start dumping applications on retail chains you'll get a call sooner than later as long as you don't come off as a complete shitbag. Even then they still might hire you if you can show up when they want. Stanos fucked around with this message at 19:20 on Nov 25, 2015 |
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Nov 25, 2015 18:22
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Danger-Pumpkin posted:No progress has been made, save that she was crying by the end of *it, and swore that if she could figure out a way to move out without breaking the lease in a bad way, she was leaving. Which at this point, I'm super happy to hear. How is it that you have enough money that you can afford her share of the rent and household expenses, but not enough money to repay any part of the $1000 she generously fronted you? Or are you drawing up plans to go out on the street and shout "someone give me a roommate who doesn't mind sharing rent with an unemployed deadbeat, please"? Because these are the only circumstances in which I would be "super happy" to hear that the person standing between me and eviction was making exit plans.
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Nov 25, 2015 18:50
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Danger-Pumpkin posted:I assume the lot of you are all gainfully employed, and that that gainful employment was the result of walking outside and shouting "someone give me a job, please," until someone gave you a job. well i can't speak for everyone but i myself got gainful employment by walking into my lovely retail job and shouting "someone give me a job, please" until one of the customers gave me a better job
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Nov 25, 2015 18:54
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Control Volume posted:well i can't speak for everyone but i myself got gainful employment by walking into my lovely retail job and shouting "someone give me a job, please" until one of the customers gave me a better job same but seasonal landscaping, which is what supported my family from around age 15 through college. it helped not burning bridges and ripping off the few friends willing and able to offer me any help, and also cutting the kinds of people who do that poo poo out of my life because they're loving poison who drag everyone they can down to hell with them A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 21:06 on Nov 25, 2015 |
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Nov 25, 2015 18:59
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blarzgh posted:Yeah, stupid bitch. Epic poo poo, grandpa
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Nov 25, 2015 19:31
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What's loving stupid is that you pretty much can find a job walking out on the street and shouting "someone give me a job, please!" it's just not going to be a very good job. I can guarantee that OP could find a job in retail or temp work within 48 hours if she really gave a poo poo. And a lovely job is a hell of a lot better than no job when you have no income, rent coming due, and owe your roommate money. OP has no excuses.
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Nov 26, 2015 11:48
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'Tell me how to weasel out of an obligation because I have decided the person who loaned me $1000 doesn't deserve it back'. You sound like a prick, OP. Is it deliberate or do you have a processing disorder? You. Owe. One. Thousand. Dollars. I hope you get bedbugs.
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Nov 27, 2015 01:16
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english muffin posted:I hope you get herpes.
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Nov 27, 2015 06:33
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Just fyi if she takes you to court you will win. She's dumb but you're a jerk.
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Nov 28, 2015 08:12
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owned i swear i know this person op. just tell me her first name gagelion is back fucked around with this message at 09:45 on Nov 28, 2015 |
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Nov 28, 2015 09:41
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She may be a paranoid imbecile (actually she isn't) but you're a friggin' idiot.
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Nov 28, 2015 11:52
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Danger-Pumpkin posted:Pretty much. If this was going to be an issue for her, why do me the favor in the first place? When I asked her why this was suddenly so pressing during the argument, she didn't really have an answer. She said something about student loans being due in two years. Which, if that was such a pressing concern, I'm not sure why she agreed to this venture to begin with. She certainly hasn't been scrimping and saving any of the other several thousand dollars she's got. Danger-Pumpkin posted:Despite that, I actually would have been able to pay my own way thus far, if my roommate hadn't reneged on her agreement to reimburse me for travel costs other than gas. I didn't choose to make an issue out of that at the time, because I thought we were friends, and that we could trust each other, and that it didn't matter as much as getting off to a harmonious start in a new place. My driving her vehicle here, packed with all of her stuff, saved her an estimate of over $4,000 in shipping. That's her price, that she quoted me. When this was brought up, suddenly the notion of a retroactive contract or agreement was not applicable, because it no longer stood to benefit her. I've been working on finding a job since I got here. Any job. I've been doing short term odd jobs to buy food and medicine with since. You can make a joke about prostitution if you wish.
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Nov 28, 2015 15:00
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