Upped and Left

[Nick Rutkowski]

This story is happening to me right now, out of the blue last night, one of my tenants terminated her lease early. She sent me a text last night saying she left. We've had her for 10 months, she was quiet, kind, when she had an issue with the apartment she would let me know and I would come fix it. Over the weekend she packed up and moved out - no heads up, no communication, no complaints. Just upped and left.  

Now, this has happened to me before. The signs are obvious when a tenant is about to leave unexpectedly. Typically someone who was communicative turns distant, unresponsive, blows you off when you're trying to talk to them in person, and the tall tale sign of boxes in the hallway. In NY tenants have to give 30 days notice before they move out to give me time to rent out the apartment again. This time, I didn't get a 30 day notice, just a "I'm leaving now, goodbye."  I think I'll just let her go and move on to the next tenant. 

On a side note, oddly, the tenant before her was also a single woman, around the same age, stayed in the apartment for 10 months, no communication or heads up, left around the same time of the year. Call it a coincidence? Well, I'm going to see how she left my apartment today, we'll see how she did. To be continued...