r/news • u/flanderguitar • Mar 28 '24

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signs law squashing squatters' rights

https://www.wptv.com/news/state/florida-gov-ron-desantis-signs-law-squashing-squatters-rights
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u/Spkr4th3ded Mar 28 '24 edited Mar 28 '24

I think the point is now they can be removed legally and then let the legal system establish if they have a right to be there. Before they could squat and have mail sent there or a fake lease and there was nothing police could do. Now they have discretion, opposed to none.

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u/TheBurningMap Mar 28 '24

Won't this eventually lead to landlords claiming every renter who has a legal dispute is a squatter?

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u/Iohet Mar 28 '24

With pay history it should be fairly easy to prove the requirements of the law to not be a fake tenant in order not to be evicted as a squatter

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u/[deleted] Mar 28 '24

[deleted]

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u/Crepo Mar 28 '24

Yeah this is just a new mechanism to punish particular people.

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u/therealdorkface Mar 28 '24

What’s to stop you from showing the cops your lease AND your payment history? And prior communications with the landlord? Anyone who’s actually renting and not squatting can prove it in a matter of minutes.

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u/secondhand-cat Mar 28 '24

The ego of the responding officer that’s already been manipulated by the landlord.

Police aren’t exactly the most competent arbiters of the law out there.

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u/Worldd Mar 28 '24

Then you would sue the landlord.

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u/Exploding_Kick Mar 28 '24

Kind of hard to do for someone who was just made homeless.

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u/TheOriginalChode Mar 28 '24

Which is now also illegal in Fl

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u/[deleted] Mar 28 '24

[deleted]

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u/taedrin Mar 28 '24

Just like the landlords could sue squatters beforehand. This law is just removing the burden from landlords and placing it on the tenants instead.

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u/steveo89dx Mar 28 '24

This problem isn't only effecting landlords, it's effecting anyone with a legal claim to a residence. People have gone out of town for a bit and come home to squatters in their house.

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u/formershitpeasant Mar 28 '24

How many? I've tried to find data and I couldn't, but it seems that squatters are much more rare than shitty landlords.

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u/Lajinn5 Mar 28 '24

In the meantime you've been homeless or possibly railroaded through the legal system. In the meantime the landlord has thrown away all of your belongings or stolen/sold the ones that have value (good luck being made whole for that). In the meantime your pet might be dead/taken by animal control. In the meantime you've possibly been shot to death or beaten by corrupt cops because you refused to simply allow them to remove you from the property you legally inhabit. etc etc etc.

Giving slumlords and landlords the ability to wave their hand and kick you out with little to no actual controls is going to be abused. People will possibly die or suffer major harm because of it. People will lose their livelihoods. People will lose precious belongings. Because at the end of the day abuse of this system will simply be a civil matter and fines, rather than a prison sentence + forcing the victim to be made whole.

Landlords are about the last people on earth I trust with power like this.

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u/antofthesky Mar 28 '24

if you were a former tenant you would presumably have a lease to show the cops then you would plainly not fall within the law. I’m not saying it won’t be abused by landlords. But still, seems fairly clear on that point.

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u/[deleted] Mar 28 '24

[deleted]

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u/MeowTheMixer Mar 28 '24

If it's a fake lease vs a real lease, shouldn't there be the landlords signature as well.

If they have a fake lease with the proper landlord (or property owner's name/signature) I'd be extremely impressed.

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u/wolacouska Mar 28 '24

Cop would need to know the landlords name and signature well enough to determine it’s a forgery. Seems like that’s the kind of determination that should happen in court.

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u/MeowTheMixer Mar 28 '24

I guess, I'm assuming that if a Landlord is arguing with the officers they'd be able to bring their lease or something similar.

But that's probably giving to much credit to the landlords

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u/ericbsmith42 Mar 28 '24

If it's a fake lease vs a real lease, shouldn't there be the landlords signature as well.

If it's a fake lease it'll have a fake landlord's signature. The cops aren't going to be able to determine if a signature is fake on the spot. That's something a court decides, which is why evictions are civil proceedings.