A class-action lawsuit trial got under way last week in Palm Beach Circuit Court alleging that one of South Florida’s largest landlords charged 14,000 former tenants more than $14 million in illegal fees and rents.
Attorneys for the landlord, Equity Residential Properties Trust, contend the allegations by the plaintiffs are exaggerated and the actual damages are far less than those claimed.
Plaintiffs’ attorney Theodore Babbitt said in his opening statement that the average illegal charge to tenants who terminated their leases early was $1,372. Babbitt said Equity Residential sometimes collected two or three months’ worth of rent or fees when a tenant left before the lease was up or didn’t give 60 days’ notice that it wouldn’t be renewed. He said that violated Florida’s landlord-tenant and fair-trade-practices laws.
“These are not the only landlords that do that, which is why this case is so important,” Babbitt said.
Craig White, an attorney representing Equity Residential, said it changed its billing and leasing practices in July 2003, seven months after the suit was filed. He said the changes were made to bring greater uniformity to the company’s lease agreements in 34 states.
He said even if the average charges to former tenants amounted to $1,372, the vast majority of those charges went uncollected and don’t constitute damages to those tenants.
Babbitt said the company used aggressive collection tactics, reported delinquent tenants to credit bureaus and obtained judgments against them.
Equity Residential has more than 80 rental complexes in Florida, including about 24,000 units.
