Am I liable for 20 year old water bill for a house I bought? I bought a house in Florida in 2017 and when I went to get the water service turned on they told me there is a water bill from 1998 and I need to pay it. Is it my responsibility even if I didn't own the house and there had been 6 other owners before me?
To get an answer tailored to your problem, you need to get a lawyer. The general answer is that the water bill goes with the property, not the person using the water. The unpaid bill can become a lien on the property, and the house can be taken and sold to satisfy the lien. There are other factors / questions. Under Florida law (180.135), if the debt arises from a renter who incurred the debt directly with the utility, a lien cannot be placed against the property. Any lien must be perfected (filed with the courts), and the point of a title search is to find such liens – assuming that a title search was done. There is a limit to how long you can wait to collect on a debt (7 years).
No, for two reasons. First, your question seems to assume that the current level of (1) vacancy, and (2) rent, will continue unchanged for the indefinite future. A lot of people thought that in 1989, and 2000, and 2007, just before the last three Bay Area housing crashes. The purpose of a long-term lease is to create certainty for the lessor. As the lessee, you are on the hook for whatever damages you cause by breaking the lease. As you say, right now, the complex will probably be able to mitigate fairly easily. That will change next time the market crashes. If you break the lease, you're gambling that it's still 1987...but there's a chance it's 1989 instead. If it is, you are on the hook, because the landlord exchanged a lower rent for certainty. Second, you're thinking about what the landlord will be able to prove in court. This is almost never the most helpful thing to be thinking in a situation like this. If you get to the point where your lawyer is having to stand up in court and argue about the reasonableness of the landlord's efforts, you've already spent more than two weeks' rent (even at Bay Area prices) paying the lawyer. Realistically, if the landlord says it took six weeks to rent, and sends you a bill for six weeks, the cheapest thing for you to do will, probably, be to pay it.
Very likely. You may own your parking space, but when you bought your condo you also signed a contract agreeing to abide by the rules of the condo association. Condo associations typically have rules that all cars parked on the property must be registered with the association. If you didn't register your friend's car with the association, they have no way of known that it isn't some random person trespassing to score free parking. Some associations may have additional rules limiting parking to residents of the building. Get in touch with your association and find out what the rules are. You should have been given a copy of the association rules when you closed on the purchase of the condo.
Actually, neither the council nor a private owner are responsible for illegal actions by unauthorised people on their property. This is obvious: if an intruder enters your property and, while there, shoots someone you cannot be held responsible. However ... Since you have made them aware that there are intruders on their property acting illegally and causing a nuisance to the neighbours and they have done nothing they are quite likely negligent, even recklessly negligent. Rather than sue them, consult a lawyer and get them to write a letter that if they do not take action by X date you are going to sue them.
No. There are plenty of Quebecois laws covering what you must have water for (food prep, bathrooms, etc) and that if you are using the water in any fashion that it might come in contact with a human mouth (i.e. food preparation, etc) it must be drinking water (as defined in the document I linked), but no such laws requiring free distribution of drinking water on request by restaurants. It's worth noting, I suppose, that tap water must be provided by restaurants in their bathrooms for the washing of hands and that said water must be of drinking water quality, but they are not required to offer it in a glass, free of charge. Anecdotally, I will also note that there are laws in several other Canadian jurisdictions that DO require free drinking water on request, but those laws also do not stipulate the glass must be provided for free.
Unfortunately, the police are correct The limit on filing a civil claim (a lawsuit where you seek monetary compensation) is before you turn 40. If you were 11 in 1985 then it is too late to sue your assaulter. For criminal prosecution, the law was changed in 2016. Prior to the change, the limitation was the same as for civil cases. After the change, there is no limit but only if the offence was committed on or after 1 January 2017. Assuming that your reference to Kelly is to this guy - the alleged offences were committed in the 1990s and the prosecutions are under Illinois, Minnesota and Federal law (the Federal crimes alleged are not the sexual assault of a minor). Each state has it's own rules.
You may contact a towing company; they will ask who you are, and will politely inform you that since you aren't the property owner, they aren't authorized to take someone else's car that is trespassing on the property. [Addendum] The first step in unraveling the legalities of the situation is seeing that only the property owner can give permission to enter (park) on the property. That permission can be rescinded, but only by the owner. The owner seems to have given permission and has stated in advance some conditions under which permission might be rescinded. The towing company could be called (by the owner) to act as the agent for the owner and remove the offending vehicle; but the towing company cannot just up an do this on their own. If they were to spontaneously tow a vehicle without officially acting on behalf of the owner, they would be liable for damages, owing to their having torted some guy's chattels. So the company will want to know that they are protected, in acting as the agent of the property owner. One way to do that is to verify that the person calling the towing company is the owner. Another would be to get the caller to swear that they are the owner and indemnify them against damages, in case they get sued. That pound of cure is more costly and annoying than the ounce of prevention of making sure that you're towing a car with proper authorization, so it's unlikely that they would just tow the car on your say-so. You might try suing the complex owner for some kind of breach of contract, if you think you have a contractual right to a parking space and they are negligent in doing what's necessary to meet your contractual right. The lease says "we may...", not "we will", so they haven't promised to absolutely enforce this rule. Or, of course, you could call the manager and mention that there's still a problem.
If the parents own the house (as shown on the official deed) it will go as they leave it in their wills, or as the local law for intestate inheritance (no will) directs. Who paid all or part of the down payment will not matter. If the intent was for that to matter, then the child who provided the down payment should have been listed as partial owner, or some written agreement should have been made specifying the rights involved. Otherwise the down payment would be considered as a gift. If the child owns the house (as shown on the deed) it would not be part of the parents' estate, and their will(s) would not affect it. It would remain the property of the child. If the down payment was a loan rather than a gift, as shown by a written agreement of some sort, then that debt would be an obligation of the estate, to be paid before any legacies were distributed.