City Paper – by Edward Ericson Jr.
Jared Kushner, the President’s son-in-law, sues his Baltimore tenants for thousands of dollars in bogus debts, on which he also gets judgments allowing him to garnish their wages and drain their bank accounts.
This according to Pro Publica’s Alec MacGillis, who reports in a story for this Sunday’s New York Times Magazine that Kushner quietly bought-up thousands of modest and run-down apartment units in Essex and other Baltimore suburbs, whose tenants complain of poor maintenance, harsh rent collection techniques, and relentless pursuit of old and sometimes dubious debts generated after tenants moved out.
MacGillis leads off with Kamiia Warren, who moved out of Cove Village in Essex years ago to get away from a crazy neighbor. She had permission to do so from the apartment’s managers, yet Kushner’s company sued her years later for breaking the lease, winning more than $3,000 plus fees and expenses: almost $5,000 total by 2014.
MacGillis finds hundreds of cases, and the story profiles several other tenants with similar experiences. A spokesperson for Kushner’s company tells MacGillis that it owes a fiduciary duty to its investors to try to collect all outstanding debts. The story does not explain how or why it’s legal for the landlord to effectively generate the debts out of thin air, or why the District Court judges routinely uphold them. He tries to talk to Kushner’s collection lawyer, Jeffrey Tapper.
“In the cases that Tapper has brought to court on behalf of JK2 Westminster and individual Kushner-controlled companies, there is a clear pattern of Kushner Companies’ pursuing tenants over virtually any unpaid rent or broken lease—even in the numerous cases where the facts appear to be on the tenants’ side,” MacGillis writes.
Tapper blows him off.
Aside from the presidential connection, the story reads much like Doug Donovan and Jean Marbella’s Baltimore Sun series a few weeks ago on Baltimore City’s rent court, where the deck is said to be stacked pretty high against tenants.
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The tenant is entering into a contract that will state the terms such as 6 month or year rent or lease, whatever it might be, the person has agreed to live there for a period of time. Just up and splitting is a breach of contract, period. I understand there certainly are situations that come up that lead to having to leave on short notice which breaks the contract of which the people should make some attempts to compensate that which will not be fulfilled in payment.
On the other hand the housing should be maintained by the owner, this is just good stewardship and makes a place pleasant to live in and will last.
Both parties have a responsibility.
A very reasonable expectation. Katie you will be the US ambassador to Palestine with a MOAB bomb for parasitic country’s that fail to heed your warning:)__!
“Trump’s son-in-law is a Baltimore slumlord, and that’s not even the worst of it”
Unchallenged.
The worst of it is he’s a stinking jew.
This wouldn’t be a problem if Kushner happened to come down with a sudden case of lead overdose.
Just sayin.