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View Full Version : Need help evicting a roommate TX


budlighthooker
07-11-2005, 08:22 PM
I currently live in my boyfriends house, he is deployed in Iraq. He has had a roommate for about a year. The have no formal lease, just a verbal agreement that he can live here and pay rent on the first of the month.

Since my boyfriend left, I believe since before that, he has been smoking in the house. I have suspected this was happening for some time but wan't able to catch him until recently. He has been told several time that smoking was not allowed before I caught him. Once catching him I asked him to stop and he did not. Then my boyfriend sent him an email explaining that there was no smoking in the house and if he did not stop he would be asked to leave. Well he didn't stop. The roommate also pays rent at least two weeks late every month.

Being tired of this we finally made the deicision to ask him to leave. I told him last weekend that he needed to be out of the house providing him with 48 hours to get out. He refuses to leave my house. Since asking him to leave he has become very combative with me and I no longer feel safe in my own home. I have a friend who is visiting and she was staying in our guest rooms with her three children. He didn't like her being here and threw a fit one night because she was parked in 'his parking spot' and because there was a soap dish and 4 toothbrushes in 'his' bathroom. He started throwing things, broke a mirror, calling her names, threatening to burn her belonging and damage her vehicle...all in front of her children. Then he decided to do something with the ac unit outside so that the ac would not work so that the kids would not go upstairs. Now here we are at the 11th and he has still not paid rent for the month.

I have called the police department and a judges office and no one will help me to get this guy out of my house, except that I have to go through a formal eviction process. I wanted to try and see if anyone could give me any suggestions before I end up having to hire an attorny to help me...which I really can not afford right now.

I did provide him with a formal notice giving him 30 days to leave for failure to comply with the no smoking rule and for paying rent late 5 of the last 5 months. Now that he has become threatening and still has not paid rent can I give an additional notice that would give him 3 days to vacate before following the eviction process??

elklaw
07-13-2005, 12:03 AM
Give him formal notice in writing, then go file to evict him. You can use the email from the boyfriend and the formal notice that details all the times you asked him to not smoke in the house and to pay rent on time to support the eviction based on some kind of oral lease or agreement. If you h ave a power of attorney from the boyfriend if he was the one who rented the unit to him, that may be needed in case he says he rents from the boyfriend, but if he has given you a power of attorney to deal with his business affairs, home, etc.., then you can show that to the court as authority for you to act as you are. I suggest going to base JAG if you have a power of attorney from the soldier to see if they can represent you for free on his behalf.

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