What to do if my tenant leaves before eviction court date Texas

Question

I'm in Austin TX

I filed for eviction on the Feb 16th, court date is March 8th. Lease is up on March 21st.
Told tenant I would drop the case if he paid up and moved out by March 1st.
Said he has moved out but there are still 2 people living there, I have no lease with them and don't know who they are.
Not sure what to do next.

Jay Dewberry · Answer

Hi Donna. Take this with a grain of salt as I'm not an attorney, nor do I attempt to portray knowing Texas housing laws. That being said, here's my two cents:

Contact an attorney. Take lease to sheriff’s department. Let them know unauthorized trespassers are currently in your home and you want them removed. This, most likely, won’t work, but your goal is to get the names of the squatters, so you can include and serve them eviction notices. Have your attorney finish the rest. When (not if), they damage your property, have attorney file a civil lawsuit against the lessee for any damages occurred from violating his lease agreement as well as a suit against the squatters. Make sure to include all costs associated with having to go through this ordeal. You may or may not see a dime, but there will be a record of this nonsense for future background checks against these individuals. Hopefully this won't happen again. Take a zero tolerance policy against them. This is your property, not theirs.

Greg H. · Answer

@Donna Pattani

Do you file against your tenant and "All other Occupants"?

I would go to the property and find out the situation but you will still need to go to court.

Are you handling the eviction and if so how much experience do you have doing so?  Just trying to figure out how to help

Deanna McCormick · Answer

Note : you should always file paperwork with known tenants name followed by " Et el " which means others.. So you totally get the apartment vacant if unknown others are living there..

Don't cancel, go to court. get the writ and proceed

You could ask court clerk if you could ammend the filing to add "Et el" otherwise you may need to do a new filing against remaining people..

Call your clerk of court and ask if they can give you any details in this instance or call attorney.

Arlen Chou · Answer

@Donna Pattani What are you evicting him on?  Is it because he broke the lease and has people in the unit that are not on the lease?

How long have the other 2 people been there?

How long have you known they have been there?

If you just found out about them, then you probably can get them removed fairly easily by servicing them notice.  However, if they have been there for a while and you have know about it, then you might be in a stickier situation.  I highly suggest you find an attorney who is well versed with squatters, because that is what those 2 other people could become if they don't leave.  But from what I hear Texas is more landlord friendly so things are probably not as bad as they could be.

-Arlen

Deanna McCormick · Answer

Or you could try and apply pressure,, tell the tenant that left your continuing with eviction action unless he get all the other people out in 24 hours and you meet and go and change the locks.. He signs paperwork saying he has vacated. you do move out and charge damages as noted and send him letter with those charges.. if he doesn't pay then small claims court.

Then you go to court and dismiss eviction action, or do that before court.

Collecting money from judgement is hard.. what your after is possession of the apartment.

Christopher Gilbert · Answer

Keep the court date and proceed until you have the cash in hand, you can always cancel the court date or show up and say it has been resolved.  Also give 30 day notice stating that the lease will not go month-to-month and you will not be renewing it.  Most tenants will move out once you serve notice but I wouldn't expect to ever see that money owed.  Once you get a judgment from the court they still usually have two weeks to appeal it.  An appeal costs them a little bit of money so they usually won't.  After that you have to schedule with the Sherriff to force eviction, usually takes a week or so to get on their schedule.  If the tenant is not out by then, you have to meet the sheriff at the property and bring a moving crew to haul all their stuff to the curb.  Change locks immediately and start the make-ready process.

Keep in mind the judgment only shows the debt on paper, they do not do anything to help you collect it.  Good luck.

Greg H. · Answer

@Donna Pattani

Keep focus on the prize which is possession of a vacant property.  Make sure he understands the being out means that all are out.  The reality is he will probably not pay as they all say they will pay.  Feel free to reach out if you have any questions with the court process

Donna Pattani · Answer

Thanx everyone, Just found out he is actually still there. Desperately doesn't want an eviction on his record, was served today. Offered to drop the case if he pays in full and moves out by the last of the month. I inherited him when I bought the house, he had 2 others that were mentioned in the lease as occupants, they are long gone and new ones moved in at some point. The 3 day was addressed to all occupants, the court papers just have tenants name. Doing it myself, first time.

What to do if my tenant leaves before eviction court date Texas

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