Giving Notice to Tenant

[John Sanderson]

I inherited a bad tenant with a multi-unit I recently purchased. The first month, October, he paid by the 18th. I tried to work with him for November rent, saying he could make 2 payments as long as the rent was paid in full by November 5th. Seeing as it's the 4th and I haven't seen a penny from him, I'm going to assume his entire rent check won't be in my mailbox tomorrow morning.

This tenant is currently on a month to month lease with 60 day notice terminate. Since his lease began on the 1st of the month, am I correct in assuming that even if I give notice now, the earliest I can have him out is January 31, 2017?

Since I'm assuming that's the case, I'm planning on waiting until the end of the month and giving him notice before December 1st in the hopes I can work with him to collect rent for November, because based on the way things are going, I'm highly doubtful I'm going to see rent checks for December and January.

So, my main question is, if it gets to January 31, and he's still in possession of the unit, do I have to file for eviction or can I go straight to the police to enforce this?

Any insights or advice on this would be extremely helpful, thank you.

[Kim Morrissey]

Hi, I'm in New York State. A year ago I purchased some Muli-family units, all with inherited tenants. NY allows landlords to file evictions themselves and I have done many without an attorney. I just finished on that I gave a 30 day notice back on August 14th ( in NY it's 30 days not 60). They paid well but had a filthy apartment with lots of sketchy people coming and going. They were told to be out by September 30th. So at that point I had to file papers with the court for an eviction. ( if they stay beyound lease it's called a holdover). I got a judgement but the judge gave them until the end of October to leave. They left late on the 1st. If they had not left I would have given warrant to the Marshal.

My multi-units are not in the best part of town and my tenants (at least some) live from paycheck tp paycheck. I try to run my landlord business a business but I also have a bit of a kind heart. I do take partial payments sometimes depending on the situation. But they have to be caught up by the end of the month, if not I'll start an eviction for not pay (called a pay or quit). Once they have been served the pay or quit demand (also called a 3 day in NY) If you do accept any money from them you have to start the process all over again. If this mas my tenant, I would just do the pay or quit.