Late rent

[Julia J]

Hi Eveybody,

I have 2 tenants that are late with their rent the third time already.

What whould be the first step that I should take? They ignored the late fee notice that I gave them last month.

This month they are already 5 days late, I didn't send the late pymt. notice yet.

Thanks a lot,
J.

[Michael Rossi]

Julia,

McNark took the words right out of my mouth - if you want to avoid conflict, SELL YOUR RENTALS TODAY! The rental business is all about conflict.

Here's the truth, without the sugar coating. You have made (are making) a bunch of newbie mistakes. These are serious mistakes and they are the same mistakes that cause many new landlords to fail. First, giving a relatively low income tenant a year long lease is RIDICULOUS. Look at the situation you are in. The tenants aren't obeying your lease and you will have a VERY DIFFICULT time evicting them for anything other than non-payment of rent. If you had a month to month lease, you could simply give them the appropriate notice and get rid of them. You have gotten absolutely nothing from the year long lease and they have gotten everything. BIG MISTAKE!

My other favorite technique with tenants that are having trouble following the lease (extra cars, wild parties, etc), is to just raise the rent every month. You can do that with a month to month lease, you can't do that with a year long lease.

Your next big mistake is not starting the eviction process the day the rent became late. You are now showing all your tenants that you are a weak landlord and they do not respect you. This is a business - nothing more or less. If you are going to survive, you MUST COLLECT THE RENT! It is imperative that you rapidly evict the scum as soon as they don't pay, not only for the money but to show your other tenants that you are serious, that you immediately evict the deadbeats! There's not a better education for your tenants than to see you pile a deadbeat's belongings on the curb when they are set out!

My suggestion is to do a little soul searching and determine whether you are really suited to this business. The tenants are NOT your friend - they're more like the pigs in a farm field. You can make money as a pig farmer, but you're going to get dirty and it's going to STINK! The same thing goes for the rental business and the tenants. It's a dirty business and the tenants definitely STINK! In either business, you've got to learn to love to wallow in the mud!