Tenant is unhappy with the rent increase

[Kar Sun]

I have a tenant that pays on time and keeps place clean.

I also offer him a desirable place to live that is being taken care of.

To me nice tenant is not the one who expects me to subsidize their rent. 

I provide a service and a roof and that is why I have responsible tenants that I chose to have a professional relationship with.

The place has lot of very desirable amenities and has a great location..

He has been with me for 3 years and I have only raised rent $125 in all these years and last year there was no rate increase.

However, things have changed.

I have expenses, taxes and other costs that must be covered as otherwise I will be in negative..

Also, there is a lot of demand.

I sent a very nice letter to a tenant stating the data and a comparison rate with the market properties.

In my market rental properties went up 124%.

The hike is $400.

Small apartments in my area go for the same as my discounted rate for him.

But the place is spacious and is a townhouse.

He is highly unhappy.

He calls it is a money grab.

He is saying that he is under duress if he decides to stay as summer is a busy season for him.

Well, the contract ends end of summer and the rate increase letter went out prior to that.

There is no rent control in my state.

And in my state I do not even have to send rent increase letters.

This tenant makes 300K in income.

I have been nice responding to his texts but it makes me think if I actually want to keep dealing with him.

He states that my property is not worth the increase.

Well, my property is in such a location and  condition that it is difficult to find anything similar.

It is also a business.

Any one wants to share a relevant experience?

Please do not bother to send me points on how to write letters to tenants; mine was very much to a point with all the data, comparison photos, prices....

I just think if as a business person himself he does not value my business why should I renew the contract especially now he says he is under duress.

[Bill B.]

IF you are charging too much, they will move. And you’ll find out you were wrong about market rates. But maybe they’ll look around and find out everything else is waay more. And they’ll either have to admit they were wrong or that they can no longer to live as nicely as they could before. 

If gasoline is up 250% what percent rent increase do they think is justified? My smallest rent increase in the last 2 years was 10%, the average is just over 20% and several we’re over 30%. 

You didn’t include the previous and current rent amounts so we can’t determine what percent you’re raising rent. But I’m going to assume your $125 over 3 years was part of the problem. You set expectations very low and you were probably under charging.

People are strange that way. If you charged someone $1.000/mo for 10 years and then doubled it to $2,000 they would have a COW. But, if you raised it $100/mo for each of those 10 years you would have collected $60,000 more in rent and they would be fine with the increase to $2,000 (from $1900).