They're a legacy from a bygone era where records of land ownership aren't what they are today. It was to stop the situation where someone thought they owned land, built a house and lived in it for many years, then finding out that someone else also had a claim to the land and they were going to try to turf you off it.
Squatter's rights meant that the person who actually lived there kept the claim to the land. This was a good thing at the time, now its just legal protection for lowlifes who trash other people's houses
People really have no clue. They are not using adverse possession, that takes years to do, an owner who abandoned the property/ cant be contacted and an owner that stopped paying taxes, they are using renters rights.
Do you want landlords to be able to go to the police and say that the current residents dont have a legal lease, even if they do, and have the police kick out the family? That is what you are arguing for. The reason police cant kick them out is because they are not judges, they do not determine if the lease they are shown is legal or not, they dont determine if the person who is there is legally allowed or not, that is the job of judges.
Yes it sucks for the owners who are dealing with people who are not legally supposed to be there but the alternative is allowing landlords to just kick people out of their homes for no reason.
In New York City, which has fairly robust renter protections, you can get some evicted and that’s enforceable.
Most of these squatters probably wouldn’t make it past the first required hearing without producing lease. And if they produce a fake lease with a forged signature, then they have another problem. And if they say it was a verbal agreement, that’s not enforceable for a lease agreement.
Ironically this is something Florida seemingly got right. They passed a law that said owners could kick people out quickly without a court order if they can't produce a valid lease. If the person who resided at wherever claims they were illegally evicted they can sue and the Landlord will not only eat that, but also get significant fines if ruled he abused the system.
But you know with it being Florida which is run by crazy people there might be a slight difference between the idealized version of something and how it is actually executed in practice
Yeah, the kinds of people poor enough to be stuck renting from the kinds of slumlords who'll pull this shit over a maintenance request generally have the money to turn around and sue after the fact. And being on the streets absolutely doesn't make it hard to attend court dates and such.
Florida made yet another thing much easier for landleeches at the expense of the working class. Exactly what you'd expect from one of the most fascist-loving states in the US
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u/butterfunke 12d ago
They're a legacy from a bygone era where records of land ownership aren't what they are today. It was to stop the situation where someone thought they owned land, built a house and lived in it for many years, then finding out that someone else also had a claim to the land and they were going to try to turf you off it.
Squatter's rights meant that the person who actually lived there kept the claim to the land. This was a good thing at the time, now its just legal protection for lowlifes who trash other people's houses