Poll: Garnished Wages from Evicted Tenants. Any Success Stories?

[Joshua Dorkin]

I was just reading a thread about someone having to evict a deadbeat tenant and was curious to get some info from all our landlords on the site.

Of the tenants you've recently evicted, what percentage of you have been able to recover owed monies?

Additionally, has garnishment worked for you?

I'm just trying to get a feel for what is happening out there right now.

Thanks.

[Account Closed]

[.....Does it take you a long time to fill your vacancies, PNW?...]]]]

It didn't used to. I only buy properties that have some desirable feature and I keep them in peak condition. I also try to have the best place in it's price band when I decide on the rent amount

This past 2 years it has taken longer to find a decent tenant. But I maintain it is cheaper to keep a vacant unit than it is to evict a destructive deadbeat and pay for all the damage they do.

Over the decades, year by year, the quality of tenants goes down. When I started in the business, my old tenant would move out one day and the new tenant would move in the next.

Then I had to change and only start to show a unit after it was vacant, because it wasn't possible to guess how much cleaning and repair I would need to do. Plus, with the scum that is out looking for a place now, I don't want to take them into my good tenant's home to see the tenant's stuff.

Still, I would clean and advertise and have my new tenant within a couple of days.

The past two years have been hit and miss. The last vacancy was filled before the old tenant's rent was used up. It rented to the first applicant

I have a vacancy right now that my phone calls are from people like 2 unmarried couples that want to share a house (no thanks), or a person that gets real disrespectful when I tell them I check credit (rejected for attitude if not bad credit). I am resigned to taking some time to fill that one.

I have seen where tenants have done $15,000 in damage. Add that to a couple of months of no rent to get them evicted, and I'd rather have my units empty than to rent to a deadbeat loser.

I used to lose my tenants when they bought a house. Now I lose my tenants when they lose their job.