Tenants that Smoke in Non-Smoking Units

[Noah Droste]

We purchased a 12-unit apartment complex in a town with around 4,000 people. This is the cheapest rent in town and the existing tenants were paying between 450-500. We've raised rents 10-12% and are rehabing units that now rent for 650. Our budget for this year is running low and we only would like to turn 1 or 2 more units. After doing our furnace filter changes we're noticing that several tenants are smoking inside. We self manage and I was l looking for advice on handling this. 

What is a good way to handle this? Should we send written warnings? Perhaps a phone-call would be best? We could also send 30-days, but we really don't want to turn that many units this year. 

If they agree to stop smoking the first time, but then we find they are still smoking should we proceed with a 30-day?  Looking for guidance on this issue and wanted to see how others handle it. 

Side note: this is our first purchase and we got in for 375k in a great little town that's commutable to two major cities in Michigan. Its going really well so far and I think we'll have most of the rents 1.25-1.5x within the next year or so.