My husband and I own a beautiful large house, but we live in another house we own in town. We have sadly decided to sell this large vacant house because we can no longer afford the mortgage. We have rented it out in order to help us make the monthly payment on it. Because of our plan to sell when the time is right, we kept the “lease” as a month to month so we can ease through the selling transaction when the time came.
Three months ago our daughter found out that her and her family were to be relocated to the area and she expressed interest in buying the house. We gave our renters a 30 day written notice on the 1st of the month to conincide with my daughter’s apartment lease of 6 months coming to an end at the end of that same month . My daughter moved out of her apartment at the end of that month because her lease had expired and we had told her that the house would be vacated by the 1st of the following month.
Come the end of the month out renters were not out and asked for an extra week as they needed more time to move. We kindly accepted, mind you, our daughter and her family have no place to live at this point. Then at the end of that week they asked for another, and we said yes, but kindly explained to them that they must be out at the end of the week for our daughter and her family are homeless.
At the end of that week they still refused to leave. The woman explained to us that she works for a lawyer and if we evicted them it would do us no good because they will be out before the court date.
We filed an Eviction, knowing well that they must have played this system before. They countered the eviction with an Affidavit as they told us they would and claimed that the trial date won't be until 4 weeks and they should be out a few days before then.
Obviously these people are just buying time and have no intention of appearing in court and in the meantime my daughter, her husband and their two very young children are homeless.
Our State Law Section 35-9-85 states that once the counter affidavit is served it “shall stand trial on the third day after the delivery to [said] sherrif….”
We must get our daughter in this home as soon as possible – can the county law differ in the amount of time it takes before it goes to court from the state law?
Also, we have done everything legally and buy the book, up on what grounds can the tenant file this counter Affidavit?
Is there anything to protect the homeowners when the tenants are playing the system? Time is crucial here.