Q: I was renting an apartment for nearly 10 years, it had toxic mold they refused to fix. I moved, they took SD, can they?
I didn’t pay the rent the month we were moving. My son had been displaced from our home due to the flooding of his room and mold since July. We moved in Oct bc they refused to do the proper remediation, or any at all, just patch work to cover the water damaged areas. I’ve spent the last 3 years mysteriously seriously ill, literally fighting for my life. I had 4 tests by 3 labs done, deadly mold in high concentrations. They refused to accept or accommodate us. I’ve spent thousands (which is debt) to remediate what we could and to relocate and have a long road of healing from the mycotoxin damage in our bodies. Need to know the exact law to present to them that they had no right to take my security deposit due to non pay of rent bc the apt is unsafe to live in. And how exactly to go about getting reimbursed for damaged items, testing, remediation and other punitive costs. I need to get moving on this situation. The entire complex is unsafe! Every bldg has water damage, some severe!
A:
If I understand your facts correctly, you left
Without paying the final month of rent and they took your security deposit to pay that rent.
There is no law that prevents that.
Indeed they are even permitted to take past due rent without having to file a court case.
https://www.legislature.mi.gov/(S(3fnatomzzlasox1y3u50udyg))/mileg.aspx?page=getObject&objectName=mcl-554-607
If you are pushing the ‘not habitable dwelling’ argument you NEED to have a competent licensed local attorney to explain if you have a case or not.
You are getting lost in the weeds of ‘they done me wrong’ so to speak and may not have properly documented your case.
Get that local attorney help and follow the advice you get.
A: I'm sorry for your ordeal. I can only speak for the injury-related attributes of your question. You could consider reaching out to law firms to try to set up a free initial consult to discuss those health/mold issues in further detail. Unfortunately, they can be difficult cases, with many law firms being reluctant to handle them. But your situation appears to have more health/lab documentation than most. Good luck
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