False advertising & witholding cheque

Hello, I'm new here and in a bit of a pickle I have posted this query in other law forum sites (so sorry if any other members have seen them). Apologies for the appalling length, but I wanted to give as much info as possible, so here goes:

I'm originally from the UK, and have come back less than two weeks ago. In September I went out to Boston to take a short uni course for a few months. I wanted to sort out temporary housing as I didn't want to spend months in an expensive hotel again, so I looked on craigslist and found an apartment I liked - $1350 a month, and the ad said fully-furnished. I called up the landlord and asked for a 3-month lease - he said he would have to do it for 4 months as I'd be moving in in the middle of September and moving out in the middle of December, so that would be 4 months' rent and he wouldn't pro-rate.

I thought that was a bit unfair, but agreed. He then decided to up the rent to $1800 a month, saying that the advertised $1350 was for a 12-month lease (even though it didn't say that anywhere on the ad, and all other ads said a year lease was required).

I grudgingly agreed to all this over the phone, as he explained that if I were to rent from September to December he wouldn't be able to find anybody to rent from mid-December onwards. I didn't understand how this was my fault that he wouldn't be able to find a tenant because the housing market wasn't busy, but again, I just agreed to send the security deposit to him via Paypal, as it was safer and I was still in the UK at this point. I did mention that the rental market was bust in MA right now and that I'd seen the ad online for the past 5 months, but this made no difference to him.

After phoning him up to confirm receipt of payment, he then told me that the bed and a small dresser were in the basement and that I would have to bring them up myself. I asked why, he said the apt was fully-furnished, he replied with yes it is, and that "all you have to bring are some plates".

I get there and the apartment is just a converted loft, with a kitchen, a box of a bedroom and a hallway for a living room - there is virtually no privacy whatsoever. There is no bed or dresser in the bedroom, no two tvs as promised, no couch, no internet connection, no phone, no gas or electric (as the previous tenants hadn't paid their bills) and no cutlery, no microwave, no toaster etc...if I had brought "just plates", this obviously wouldn't have been sufficient. There were a couple of cabinets there that were broken and reeked, and the place was absolutely filthy. The lights were also broken on the stairway, which was dangerous.

When I called him up to ask when furniture would be brought up I was told to my face that "this isn't the Marriott" and that I should bring it up myself. I should probably add that I am fairly tall but weigh less than 8st, and I have a long-term chronic injury in my elbow, knee and ankle, and cannot lift anything, yet this landlord is three times the size and height of me. He offers to find help that I could pay for, but I refuse to pay the first and last month's rent until he honours the ad.

His wife (who's a medical doctor going to law school, and was talking things over with me while her husband was outside smoking cigars and complaining to my boyfriend about "wimmin" - so I'm sure she does all of the work), agrees to pro-rate the first month's rent and have people bring up the furniture at no extra cost to me, and gets me to sign a lease based on this agreement, and the landlord ends up going downstairs to the basement with my boyfriend to get things. BF tells me later on that everything downstairs reeked of mould, that the dresser was stained and covered with mould, and that the "two tvs" were broken, one of which was actually split in half.

A couple of days later, still no furniture, and I'm at my boyfriend's apartment as there has been nowhere else to stay. They barge into my bf's apartment and start yelling at him for the 1st and last rent (even though he's not or would never be staying there, and his name's not on the lease).

His wife asks rudely what we want, and I give her a printout of the original ad, politely saying I want it fully furnished as advertised and promised - especially if I'm paying $1800 a month for a one-bedroom (the highest I've ever SEEN for an apartment in that area). She has no idea he wrote that ad; after they leave and we go into the other room, I hear them come back into the apartment and grab something (turns out it was the ad, but I'd made copies).

After bringing up a "bed" with a nice cover on it, my boyfriend warned to look under it and saw that the mattress was heavily soiled and stank of god knows what. The bedframe was broken and the headboard took up 3/4 of the length of the room, twice the width of the bed and did not match the bedframe, which was broken. My bf explained that the furniture the LL gets comes out of the trash (as he knows the labourers that work for him - they're the landlord's tenants, and they worked for free, so thank god I didn't pay him to find people!).

At this point the LL is sick of my apparent complaints, so we agree to break the lease and give me my security deposit back, except they've now apparently changed it to the first month's rent. They take off $100 for Paypal fees and charge me $60 per day for the five days that my luggage was there (no bed or hot water, so I couldn't sleep or shower there), and got a cheque for $1400. She gives it to me on a Saturday, then it's the weekend and the banks are shut.

The nearest branch of their bank is not within walking distance, so a little over a week later I head out there in a taxi (my disability prevents me from driving), the following Monday only to realise I'd lost the cheque. I knew I'd had it the day before, as I'd seen it in my wallet (admittedly the stupidest place to keep a cheque).

I was too scared to call up the landlord as the last time I phoned him up I was being a wuss and he actually made me cry lol (about the bed), so that very day, my BF called up and politely explained the situation, that I just had the cheque yesterday and that I'd lost it, and that I can wait for another cheque but to please please cancel that one, so that nobody else tries to cash it. He says he will tell his wife when he can as her phone's been stolen and get back to us.

Days go by, and we call again. He then explains his wife has lost her phone and that she's at a medical conference, but we catch him out and say we thought it was stolen. He says "yeah, yeah sorry" and that he would get his wife to "check on the status of that" (that was all he would say to us). He keeps this up for a good month and a half.

Eventually I call him up from my new phone; he has no idea who I am as it's been weeks, but when asked I politely explain who I am and he immediately hangs the phone up on me.

Needless to say I am furious at this point, knowing he was lying the whole time, and left a message saying I was going to call the police. They advised me to go to small claims court, which I am next month.

The issue is I never got a copy of the lease, I just have Paypal receipts, emails, and the original advertisement. Do I really have a leg to stand on? I ended up going through a real estate agent to get the apartment I ended up staying in for the time I was out there, and she guessed his name before I'd even said it.

She said she'd constantly turn him away as she refused to represent his properties, and referred to him as a "slumlord" (he'd put in new rugs in the apartment next door, and encouraged college-age students to bring in dogs so they would mess it up and he'd keep their security deposit). Apparently he's had restraining orders taken on him by his sister and he's been charged with embezzling money and property from his own mother. His wife went to Harvard medical school and now law school - am I in way over my head? The realtor advised I sue and ask for triple damages (I did for the $1400, not the $1800), but I'm petrified that I'm going to waste even more money heading back there and get absolutely nothing back.

BF summed this up nicely - "when you called up he thought, 'doctor's daughter, calling up all the way from England, going to [insert snooty college here] = jackpot!!'"...Unfortunately this couldn't be further from the truth.

[OHlandlord]

The police were correct. The only way to get your money back now is to go to small claims court. First, get your ducks in a row by collecting every scrap of paperwork you can about the unit - the printed out ad, any notarized statements you can obtain showing what was in the apartment for furniture, write down deatils about every conversation you can remeber with them, get copies of the paypal receipts where you agve them money, etc. You need all your documentation to prove you paid them, signed a lease, what promises they made trhough the ad but didn't keep, the fact that the utilities weren't on, etc.

Then send a letter to the landlord demanding the complete return of your $1800 deposit. Remind him that you could never live in the unit for lack of furniture, utilities, etc. and that you disagree with his deductions. Remind him that you requested a replacement for the lost check and that he failed to send it, and that you never received a written statement of deposit deductions (did you?) showing what they took out of your deposit as required by state law. Quote Mass. General Laws Ann. Ch. 186, statute 15B (which is the statute on security deposits and their return). You should look up and read this statute yourself. Send this letter to him by certified mail, return receipt requested, and keep a copy for yourself. In the letter, give him 10 days to respond to your demand for the deposit. If he fails to send you money back to you, sue him in small claims court for the maximum amount allowed (if the agent said it was 3 x the deposit, she's probably right). Good luck and keep us informed.