Tenant Gets Caught In Middle Of Rent Grab Between Financially Struggling Condo Association & Deadbeat/Rent Skimming Landlord

In Sarasota, Florida, the Sarasota Herald Tribune reports:

• Paula Salgado has faithfully paid the rent on her condo, which she loves, and she plans to keep paying. But she's concerned about what might seem like a silly question: Where the heck should she send the checks now? A new and sloppily worded Florida law puts that in doubt.

• Salgado, a Herald-Tribune employee, told me the three-bedroom condo unit she shares with a roommate at Las Palmas of Sarasota is perfect, and their $1,100 monthly rent is a good deal. Her landlord, Ray Simmers, wants her to keep sending rent checks to him, as she has since she moved there in December.

• But like other renters in Florida, Salgado just received a letter by certified mail, thanks to a state law effective July 1. Hers came from Tampa lawyer Bruce M. Rodgers, who represents the Las Palmas of Sarasota condo association. The letter says her landlord, Simmers, owes the association more than $15,000 in unpaid association fees and demands that Salgado write future rent checks to Rodgers' law firm to pay down the debt. The letter says the new law authorizes this demand. It lists the statute number, and warns that the association can evict Salgado if she doesn't comply.

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• She sent Simmers an e-mail saying the law seems to require she do as the association demands. Simmers sent a one-word reply. "Nuts," it said. Later, he added that "not paying the rent to me will affect your status and credit."

For more, see Lyons: Not their fight, but they're thrown in it.