Leo Behaj is still recovering financially from an expensive — and regrettable — decision.
"I said to my friends, I said, 'From an American dream, it can become an American nightmare,'" Behaj said.
Stream NBC10 Boston news for free, 24/7, wherever you are.
WATCH HEREWhen Behaj immigrated to the United States from Albania 15 years ago with his wife, Irena, the couple settled in Ipswich along the North Shore of Massachusetts.
Years later, they decided to purchase a home in Reading. Behaj said his family planned to move into the home so his two children could attend high school in that community.
Get updates on what's happening in Boston to your inbox with our News Headlines newsletter.
SIGN UP "I was a new landlord," Behaj said. "I was just trying to rent it for a couple of years."
After listing it for rent in 2021, Behaj signed his first lease with Bryan Coombes and his wife, Nicole Inserra. He says the couple told him the Reading property appealed to them because it would allow them to keep their kids in the school district.
Behaj says he contacted a reference and received a positive report about the prospective tenants. He now suspects that the person he spoke with on the phone was not a former landlord.
Almost immediately after moving into the property, the couple had complaints about the house and the rent checks stopped.
"That's when I knew who I was dealing with," Behaj said.
'These people have a PhD.'
And so began a two-year odyssey through housing court for Behaj and his family. During proceedings, Behaj says Coombes represented himself and seemingly knew every trick in the book to delay the eventual eviction.
Behaj, a branch manager at a bank, took on a second job as an Uber driver to pay the bills and avoid a foreclosure of the Reading property. Behaj said the financial strain cancelled birthday parties and family vacations so he could afford paying two mortgages.
"They're professionals," Behaj said. "I went to college five years to become who I am professionally. These people are doing this 20 years. These people have a PhD. They have everything for how to screw the system."
The NBC10 Boston Investigators reviewed housing court records and found 12 eviction cases in Massachusetts over the past two decades. Some of the cases have different spellings of Coombes' first and last name.
According to court records, Peter Amato and his family were at the beginning of the 20-year pattern.
"It got really bad, really fast," Amato recalled when we contacted him about his former tenants.
The property on Mount Pleasant Street in Woburn was a duplex that Amato's father had purchased to help him and his brother get on their feet as they started their careers.
When Amato and his wife, Teri, moved out in 2004, Coombes and Inserra moved in and almost immediately stopped paying the rent, according to court records.
Amato said the couple went to the city's health department and filed complaints for everything from lightbulbs to asbestos to lead paint.
After months of legal costs and lost rent, Amato said his family finally made a painful decision. He could see the stress the situation was putting on his elderly parents.
"It was either pay them and stop bleeding out money, or fight them and bleed out money and put yourself in financial chaos," Amato said. "It was cheaper to give them $20,000 and tell them to get lost."
Despite track record, couple receives taxpayer rental assistance
Coombes and Inserra still appear to be working the system.
Since we started investigating, court records show they have been fighting to stay inside a Burlington property on Mohawk Road.
Bob Lee is the attorney who has been trying to get the couple evicted since filing the case last September.
"Their whole entire goal is just to stay on the property as long as possible, paying the least amount of money possible," Lee said. "It doesn't take a lot of effort to play the system that way."
Despite the lengthy paper trail in housing court, records show taxpayers provided more than $23,000 of rental assistance through the HomeBASE program. Massachusetts residents are eligible if they meet income standards and have children under 21, according to the online description.
State taxpayers also kicked in more than $13,000 of rental assistance while Coombes and Inserra lived at Behaj's property in Reading. The funds are paid directly to property owners.
"Why is that possible? Shouldn't something different be done?" Lee asked. "You would think there would be some more strict scrutiny as to what's going on with the applicants."
A spokesperson for the Executive Office of Housing & Livable Communities said the agency could not discuss individual recipients of rental assistance for privacy reasons.
We asked if there is any screening of eviction records before approving funds and are awaiting a response.
Tenant: 'The law helps me do what I need to do.'
Earlier this month, we observed a hearing in Northeast Housing Court in Woburn, where Coombes argued his case. The tenant has already successfully delayed the execution of an eviction on multiple occasions by filing motions and appeals, according to the docket.
Outside of court, NBC10 Boston approached Coombes to ask about his track record and allegation that he is a "professional tenant."
"That's not true. I use the law, and the law helps me do what I need to do," Coombes responded. "I don't avoid paying rent. I use the law to my advantage when people don't fix things that are supposed to fix things."
Coombes disputed that he has 12 eviction cases in his background. He did not answer a question about taxpayers helping to subsidize his monthly rent.
We also asked about property owners who have lost tens of thousands of dollars to Coombes and Inserra.
"The landlords I've had trouble with in the past never fixed anything, so stuff happens like this," Coombes said. "They should fix things when they're broken. That's all I have to say."
The owner of the property in Burlington filed an affidavit this week, saying he and his wife plan to move back into the house once he takes possession because he can't afford to pay two mortgages and risks foreclosure.
In the court filing, the property owner said he has amassed nearly $100,000 in losses, including unpaid rent, legal fees, repair costs and money he has borrowed from friends and family to stay afloat.
"Without the court's immediate intervention to allow me to take rightful possession of my property, this is an unsustainable, unreasonable and unjustifiable situation for any landlord," the affidavit said. "There is no scenario where the tenants can make me whole."
'Welcome to America … Free everything.'
Attorneys say one other tactic "professional tenants" use is to file bankruptcy to automatically pause eviction proceedings.
Federal court records show Coombes and Inserra have filed a combined nine bankruptcy cases, including five in 2023 when Behaj had them as tenants.
All of the cases were eventually dismissed for failure to file required documentation.
Josh Burnett is a bankruptcy attorney who has seen his share of serial Chapter 13 filers for people trying to avoid foreclosure or eviction. He said the automatic stay is limited once there has been a bankruptcy dismissal in the calendar year.
Burnett reviewed the federal court filings and offered an opinion about what transpired.
"It's pretty obvious that they never intended any of these cases to be successful," Burnett said. "They were just trying to buy time."
Behaj said his family lost about $95,000 in unpaid rent and legal fees after dealing with Coombes and Inserra for more than two years. Instead of moving his family, he sold the home in Reading to begin to climb out of debt.
The last text message that Behaj said he received from Coombes was an emoji of a middle finger on eviction day.
"We provided them the house for free, the funds to move left and right … taxpayer money," Behaj said. "He goes to court, he doesn't pay a fee because it's an eviction -- I'm paying the fee. Welcome to America! What can I say? Free everything."
