Legal Question in Landlord & Tenant Law in Virginia

Re: Can i sell her stuff to cover my losses?

Generally speaking, there is NO right to simply

keep someone's belongings and sell them to

satisfy a debt. People talk about that all the

time, including landlords and others. Normally,

you must go to court and get a judgment from the

court first, and then you must go through legal

process to "attach" or "garnish" or "seize"

property under a court order.

However, your situation is different.

If someone ABANDONS their property in YOUR

apartment (or whatever location), so that you

are left storing them, then I think there comes

a point at which you are not obligated to keep

STORING someone else's property at YOUR expense

(or burden, if no actual expense).

So they key thing here is whether she has

effectively ABANDONED her belongings and dumped

them on you.

To the extent that the property has been

abandoned, it is in some sense similar to a gift

to you, and you can do whatever you want with it.

How do we know if it has been abandoned? How

long must you wait? This really depends upon

the facts of the situation, and there is no

magic rule.

Therefore, to protect yourself, I think you

should make VERY clear and certain, without any

doubt, that you have warned her to come and take

it away or put it in storage or you will dispose

of it, and you give her a reasonable amount of

time to get that done. (Like 10 days or two

weeks.) If you can prove that you have given

her actual, CLEAR NOTICE, and she has still left

it with you, then she has abandoned it.

If you are confident that you can PROVE that

you have already given such notice, you might not

need to wait any longer.

But remember that in a legal dispute, people

will deny what you think is obvious. So you

should probably have it in WRITING or have a

witness to a conversation, so that it can't be

denied.