Lease wasn't signed correctly and tenant always pays late

[Eva Taylor]

I am a very new landlord. We bought our house turned rental nearly three years ago this coming summer. Last December my husband's job was moved 150 miles away so we had to relocate. We didn't want to try selling our home since we do want to move back. Due to this choice we decided to rent out our house rather than selling it. I did a lot of research, found a lease and set out about finding a good renter.

The renter we found sounded very intelligent over the phone and once I met her in person she seemed ok. She was to move in on the 25th of September and at that time she was to have the $700 first months rent and a $700 dollar security deposit. I met her at my rental at that time. She had her car packed and her husband was driving up from downstate with the rest of their belongings in a rental truck. At that time she had only $1200 of the $1400 needed to move in. She said she would get the rest to me by mailing a check. By this time I was feeling pressured so I gave in. This was one of the first major mistakes I made. I also gave her the lease to sign and have her husband sign it when he got there, they were then to return the lease to me when I came up next. Several days afterward I ended up having to drive to two hours to get the rest of my money from her since she had an excuse of not finding her checks, she couldn't get the money from the atm, etc..At that time I also got the lease.
Once I was home and I had examined the lease I found they had not signed and initialed it as it was supposed to be. The lease is on page 34 of this link. http://www.legislature.mi.gov/documents/publications/tenantlandlord.pdf
What they did fill in was on the first page. I had signed the lease at the time of the move in and even had showed the women where to sign and initial. Once I had discovered this error I notified the tenants. She said they would sign it correctly, however, when I drove up again to have them sign it they weren't home. I have to drive 2.5 hours one way to get to my rental. I had spoken with them before the trip to make certain they would be there but they made other plans after the fact. I also copied and emailed them the lease but they still never signed it and returned it. So, I didn't push it.
Now it is January and so far they have had an excuse each month why they don't have all the money by the due date. Eventually I do get all of the rent after many apparent lies by the tenant. This month I got the "my grandmother died" excuse. Previously I have sent out the notice to quit paperwork and they always had paid before it can be filed with the court. I am at the point that I want them out. I am sick of the lies and the accusations from my renter that I am "trying to maker her feel like a deadbeat".

My question is, is the lease valid since it wasn't signed correctly? What legal options do I have?

[Luis A.]

First, by putting up with the excuses you are actually making the situation acceptable to them, is like you are consenting due to your actions.

Whether the lease being signed correctly is enough to kick them out would probably be down to a judge to decide but is not very strong. And again if you go to court a judge will question why you have accepted late payments in the past as that would imply that you are Ok with accepting payments like that.

Jon is correct that the way to do it is through eviction and for that they would have to violate the lease. Check your state laws to see what is the eviction process and dates. You need to follow those eviction procedures to the T or the judge will throw out your eviction request.

On the other hand it sounds that since they break the agreement every month it should not be so hard to get them evicted the next time they don't pay.