Raising Rent on Newly Purchased Property with Existing Tenant

[Vince Rosario]

What is the procedure in this scenario?: I'm closing soon on a duplex with one existing tenant. The rent for this particular unit, according to my research, is severely below market. I want to raise it by $250. What is the procedure for this? By law, do I need to give the tenant at least 30 days notice? Do I terminate their existing month-to-month rental agreement on the day I get the keys and put into effect my new rental agreement with the rent increase? I'm not too concerned with vacancy because this particular rental market is pretty hot right now. I filled the other unit pretty quickly. Any thoughts you can share will be greatly appreciated!

[Marc Ramsay]

I am in the middle of this with not one tenant, but about 35. I purchased a building that was a LIHTC building but it lost that status on the foreclosure when I bought it. For any tenant on a month to month we gave 30 days notice and bumped them $25 and left them on a month to month lease, then 4 months later we did it again. Over the last 8 months we have lost some tenants and replaced them with market rent ones, and others have just paid the higher rent because they like living there. By sometime later this year the whole building will be market rents.

Luickily Ohio doesn't have any laws that restrict how much I can inccresase rent. I just have to abide by any leases currently in place.

In your case, if there is no law governing max rent increases, and you aren't worried about vacancy, and the tenant is on a month to month, then by all means give them the appropriate notice and then increase the rent and get them to sign a new lease. Also, as @George Paiva mentioned, you may want to see what kind of a tenant you have before deciding if you want to renew their lease or not.

No legal advice here, just my 2 cents...

Good luck!