Landlord paid electric bill, now want's to be repaid.

[Fish]

I moved into a trailer park Dec 2000. The owner used a property manager. About March 2001 I notified the property mananger that I hadn't received the past couple of electric bills. The park manager said they were paid. The owner of the place said that I pay the electric bills. That's perfectly fine with me since that is what was agreed to in the lease. A couple of months go by and I recieve bills and promplty pay them. Then from June 2001 until I give notice in Nov 2001 that I'm moving out in Dec I didn't receive any electric bills. The owner notifies the property manager that I owe him $450+ for bills I didn't pay, but he paid. The bills had been paid, just not by me. As it turned out, the owners wife, who handles the paperwork end was paying them. The electricity is in the owners name. After the whole fiasco that followed, I then didn't recieve the Dec bill. Do I owe him any money?

 

[Michael Wechsler]

Look at it this way -- it looks like he floated a couple of months worth of electricity bills that you were responsible to pay. He asked you for payment very late. I'm not sure that's a fiasco but a situation that most would prefer to be in! In a way it's an incovenience but you knew or should have known the bills weren't paid because you didn't pay them! Why would you think you don't owe him the money... a little miscommunication and late presentation for payment?