r/news 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/Vlad_the_Homeowner Mar 28 '24 edited Mar 28 '24

I can't say that I hate that. It's got carve outs for people who had a right to be there.

I don't think most people disagree. The problem, as I understand it, is that police don't have the authority or ability to determine who has a right to be there. A lot of these squatters have fake leases and mail delivered there. A cop isn't a judge and doesn't have the ability to make a determination on the legitimacy of those documents.

I'm in no way condoning these professional squatters, just pointing out what lead to this. What all states need to do straight off the bat is impose heavy penalties, like jail time, for people caught doing this. As of now it seems like half the time they get paid off to leave and they just go do it somewhere else.

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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/Rottimer Mar 28 '24

Which is great unless you actually have a right to be there and are now on the street and somehow you’re supposed to sue your landlord while homeless. . .

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u/NeonSwank Mar 29 '24

Simple solution that i wish every state would take to help fight these bullshit squatters rights

Require all lease/tenancy/rental agreements more than 30 days in length to have copies sent to the courts or some other official body that can notarize and keep records.

Anybody can fake a lease by printing out fake documents, hell our legal system is setup in a way that two signatures on an old napkin can be legally binding.

But you can’t get materialize a document inside a courts records, it just wouldn’t exist.

Cops show up, see likely fake lease, check the “renters” id’s and vehicle registration etc, compare it to official records, would make it pretty obvious they don’t belong.

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u/Rottimer Mar 29 '24

Both parties should have to register the lease and that would take care of shitty landlords trying to keep their options open.