Renter Battle I am ready

General General Discussion
1

I own a duplex rental property in a neighborhood that has seen better days. The house is in solid condition. It is my wifes grandmothers old house. I am making money on the investment, so far.

We had some big storms in western Pennsylvania last month. My rental had some roof damage that caused a hole in the ceiling of a bedroom in the 2nd floor. There was also some damage in the attic.

My insurance company dragged their feet and took 8 days to inspect it. After a battle with them, I received my insurance check and began contractor shopping for the repairs. The contractors are swamped here due to the damage in the area.

FSA tenant ( she does work, but milks all the usual govt. programs) decides not to pay rent until the repairs are completed. I explain to her that she is in violation of the lease. I also notice during the damage inspection that she has her FSA mother living with her. Another lease violation. The place is also unclean, so I hit her up for this lease violation. She refuses to pay, so I file a pay and quit notice, along with the lease violations, and post it at the address and serve it via registered mail.

She caves and promises to pay. I called my real estate attorney and have him on deck to handle this matter, if needed.

Another twist to the story. She files a complaint with the county health dept claiming that the place is unlivable. The ceiling hole is covered by drywall and the roof leak is fixed. I will call these guys next week to handle this complaint.

I offered a way out by offering to let her out of the lease early, as long as she pays the rent. This shows me as the good guys in case I need to evict.

The tenant wants the repairs done yesterday, yet she has an illegal tenant living there? I am ready to go to court, but there is always a risk to this tactic. If you guys have any other ideas on how to handle this, let me know. Thanks.

2

I have been through a similar rental property here in Florida. The renter decided not to pay until repairs were made. I initiated an eviction with my attorney. The repairs were made while the eviction was in process. The court ordered the renter to pay the rent to the court directly and they did not. They were also running a “commercial” kitchen/food delivery out of the apartment which violated the lease terms.
The judge told my attorney that as long as the renter paid the rent, there would be no eviction. They failed to pay so they were evicted.
After the eviction, they called every single local government department to complain about everything. I had inspectors coming to investigate all sorts of things that were not true.
In the end, it all worked out. What I learned is that the court seems to give the renter a lot of slack as long as they pay. I hope it works out for you.

O

3

Nor sure what the terms of the lease are but if I were the tenant I’d understand it would take a reasonable amount of time to effect repairs but at the same time I think it would also be reasonable to not have to pay a full months rent and some adjustment should be made.

Problem is you have a FSA tenant so there will be no “reasonable” involved and she will try and get all the free shit she can. Given the additional violations I’d recommend trying to evict her as soon as possible.

Plenty of poor decent people looking for housing. Just make sure you are a decent landlord if you are able to find such tenants.

4

Evict her NOW. Do not give even an inch.

5

Are you a landlord?

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6

You might as well have just said, “land on the moon NOW.” Evicting a tennent is one of the most difficult things for a landlord to do. The time it takes to complete the legal process in some places exceeds the duration of a standard lease.

7

You two must have rocks in your brain. I am not a landlord, and I am also not ignorant of tenancy laws.

Evict her now, do not give an inch means just that: push the legal eviction process as hard as it can be pushed and do not relent no matter what overtures the tenant may make.


You have a history of personal attacks, baiting and instigation. Check your PM’s and stop it now. -SeriousStudent

8

Not only are you abrasive, you clearly have NO IDEA what you are talking about! Become a landlord, then & only then, will your opinion on this subject matter.

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9

Wow. It looks like i missed some lively discussions here on this subject. I am going for the eviction. It is definitely more difficult to evict In this day and age.

Being a landlord is not easy. I will keep you guys updated on my saga. :cool:

10

As a renter renting in a competitive market here are my thoughts.

You have obviously played a heavy hand in response to her heavy handed response to the hole in the roof of the house she is paying to live at. I’ve personally never missed rent, and never threatened to withhold rent, but with my current asshole landlord I have been tempted. Luckily he lets me fix stuff myself and so I have a livable place because I am a skilled contractor and he is a neglectful piece of shit who is raping the hardworking community of their paychecks by exploiting the landlord inflated cost of living that is in my area…

But, that’s just my situation. :slight_smile:

For the record I have outstanding credit. The Mortgage broker looked at it and said “Wow, you have outstanding credit, but because of your student loans, we wont give you a mortgage.” So let’s not go down the assumption road about who I am as a person simply because I am playing devils advocate.

What I think you should do is sit down and have a reasonable conversation with her. Let the mother thing go for a bit, and tell her that you have received your insurance check and you are looking for a contractor that will ensure that she only has to deal with a repair crew once as opposed to every time there is a storm. If you can get her to pay her rent while you work out the repair you win in the long run as you are not trying to deal with two things (the property and the tenant). As for her mother, let it go for now. Put it in the bank and use it later if this person continues to be avoid paying rent, or becomes a further pain in the ass.

Why?

Let me ask you two questions. Where would you tell your mother to sleep if she needed a place to stay? Your mother??? I’m not really an advocate of kicking mom onto the street. And, if you had limited income and you were paying a majority of it to rent a place and there was a hole in the roof how would you feel? Seriously, how would you feel about that?

Your tenant doesn’t sound like a winner, but if you’re going to be a landlord you need to learn a bit of empathy or you are just going to find yourself in a cycle of crap tenants, evictions, and paperwork. If you doubt what I am saying I can provide you with my rental references so you can call about my character. You’ll find I’ve never lived in a place less then three years, I pay rent on time every month, and I only call when stuff really breaks. You want tenants like me and the only way to get there is to talk and really get to know your renter while also having a tough application/interview process. Renters look for good landlords as much as landlords look for good tenants. Even if your neighborhood has gone to shit, there are good people in that neighborhood who are looking for a quality place to live where they can be at peace in a safe, comfortable, quality location. If you develop that reputation you wont have to deal with this drama and the money will just enter your account once a month.

Good luck, and lets hope you find a solution that doesn’t cost you tons of time and money with lawyers, courts, and the state breathing down your neck.

11

I have handled hundreds of Landlord/Tenants disputes over the years and found that tenants who have no finical stake (Security Deposit) tend to forgo normal care and cleanliness of the property and are combative and non compliant to the terms of the lease.

While its true the courts have heavily sided with the tenant the landlord if smart can use the same system against the tenant to either gain compliance or eviction. Many landlords use the health department or neighborhood services of the police department to address issues inside and out of the property. Violations of occupancy can be addressed with additional rent or fee’s buts its all how such issues are spelled out in the lease.

But one must remember that the tenants will most likely to trash the location on eviction so heavy insurance is a must.

12

Even though it’s not the most palatable option, it sounds like the money ahead choice going forward isn’t going to be a push for eviction - by the end of that process you’ll have a happy lawyer, an apartment that looks like a shitstorm, and have only just finished dealing with contractors for the insurance covered fix.

Would it be worthwhile to enlist the tenant’s help (not for actual assistance, but to close the information gap) on finding a contractor? If there’s one thing this tenant (and mother) should be in great position to do, it’s calling contractors to see if they have cancellations or openings, and can work on that location sooner. Doubt it would work, but in the process you won’t have to explain that it’s not you dragging your feet to get that fixed - and that you’ve already done what you can.

If anything, don’t rely on any financial stake as motivation - mention and insist that your tenant is still better off here waiting it out; I sincerely doubt your tenant wants to deal with trying to relocate themselves and a parent. If nothing else, it should make the (inevitable probably) deal with county health inspection go smoother.

Once it’s fixed, might be worthwhile to charge whatever late fees are in the tenant agreement, and then only opt to waive them once all the backrent is paid in full - it might be worth the hassle to act empathetic about wanting to pay rent on a place that isn’t fixed back to 100% - the rental agreement is on your side, and once you have it fixed you can show up smiling, thank them for their patience, and just ask how soon they can be current with the rent.