Fugitive's hideout nextdoor

[Bill McCaslin]

A quick rundown. At the far secluded end to a Pennsylvania country lane, sits two houses, one house I've rented for 10 years, and the second house where my landlord's son and his family live and have so for about the past 18 months.  Two years ago, the previous owner passed away, and the new landlord purchased the properties, I signed a month to month lease. All good, despite a huge increase in traffic to the property - mostly in early morning hours.  

Cut to more recently- the State Police raided the property and reviewed with me the extensive criminal history of the wanted fugitive son living next door.   Theft, Burglary, Assult, Drugs, Drugs, Drugs.   

I canceled my outgoing rent check to my landlord (the neighbor's father) and spoke with the landlord on the phone.  My landlord was fully aware of his son's current legal and criminal dealings and was completely understanding and allowed rent to be foregone while his son gathered his belongings and moved out asap.  

Several months later, and his son has not permanently moved out.  I have not sent a rent check out of a failed expectation of safety since my conversation with the police.  My failed expectation of safety is rooted in the frequent early morning visitors often get the wrong house on the first try, theoretically allowing for a dope head to walk into my house at any hour, the fact that the son is still at large and we could be raided by the State Police again at any moment, and the fact that the secluded nature of the area makes our side of the property easily surveilled by the other side - which is not optimal when my wife is home alone.

My landlord is now seeking damages for the lost rent and has served me with an eviction notice.  As far as my maintaining the withheld rent goes, what are my rights?  I am more than happy to move at this point, however, I believe I may have the rights to withhold the rent balance.    Thanks for reading.  

[Kyle J.]

If I was the landlord in this scenario, I would handle it similar to how your landlord did....file for eviction and sue you for past due rent.

Granted the son doesn’t sound like a great guy, but he also lives in a completely separate single family house from you. It’s not like you’re both in adjacent units in a small apartment complex. I didn’t read where the two of you have ever had a run in or even a conversation with each other.

Ultimately though, it sounds like the biggest thing working against you in this scenario is that you are on a month-to-month agreement, which means you could have moved out at any time with proper notice if you felt so unsafe. However, rather than do that, you chose to stay there with your wife and live rent free. It’s going to be hard to overcome that in court, in my opinion.

Anyway, since you asked about your rights with regard to withholding rent, in your state (like most) there is something called the “implied warranty of habitability”. So if you had a serious repair issue (i.e. no heat, no water, dangerous electrical, etc), then your state gives you the right to repair the defects and deduct the cost of the necessary repairs from future rental payments. It’s referred to as “repair & deduct”. I could go more into it, but it’s obviously not relevant to this situation so I won’t.

Good luck and I hope this situation works out for you either way.