TENNANTS GONE, PLACE TRAHSED

[Elijah Jay Dangerfield]

Okay so I have a friend who's having this problem and I wanted to see exactly what can be done about it and what you guys think. On my friends property, the tenants trashed the place and left, I guess there were issues before and 3 months of rent has gone unpaid. Now he is left with the mortgage and to fix the damaged after the tenants trashed the place. He is pressing charges and the police are involved. Now what?

[Rob D.]

Originally posted by @Adam Nagao:

I am going through this right now.  For me it's 5 months and 10 days unpaid rent only because that's how long it took in court to get an order of possession and then have it enforced.  After taking possession there is several thousand dollars of damages to the property to account for also.  Tenant is self employed so wage garnishment isn't an option.  I don't expect to collect a dime but I'm going to at the very least get a judgement.  Even if I can't collect on it it will reflect on their credit and pop a red flag for future potential landlords and financial institutions.  I wouldn't mind for this approach to become industry standard so tenants more often than not face the consequences.  

There are ways to get money from self employed. These are usually the hardest people to collect from simply because they dint have traditional wages, but it's not impossible. I scrutinize self employed twice as hard as any other applicant. Because it's so easy to fake tax returns, income etc. DON'T ever let people screw you over. There is rarely a nothing can be done approach. partly why I don't just rent to the first persn that comes along. 

Some light reading. I wasn't sure if you can list links to other sites

First, you can garnish the cash draw. This simply means issuing a Writ of Garnishment, which is a court order authorizing the Sheriff or Law Enforcement Official to go to the business and seize any money found at the business. The garnishment may be issued for the cash draw and/or the cash register and/or any money found on the person of the business owner. The Writ of Garnishment for the cash draw will not typically result in the collection of enough cash to satisfy the debt. However, it does not take this occurring more than once or twice before the self-employed debtor will contact you and make arrangements for satisfaction of the debt.

A second effective method of collecting from the self-employed debtor is a Writ of Execution or Attachment on the work vehicle and tools of the business or business owner. Again, this is a court order issued by the court directing the Sheriff to go to the place of business and seize certain physical assets of the business. I typically file Writs of Execution for the vehicles and for the tools of the trade of that business. For example, for a plumber, the Writ of Execution would specify the work truck and all of the plumbing tools found on the premises. Again, auction of these items on the courthouse steps, will not typically generate sufficient cash to satisfy the outstanding judgment. However, before you can proceed to auction, I guarantee you will be contacted by the self-employed debtor seeking arrangements for satisfaction of the debt and return of his vehicle and tools.

A third effective method for collection of a debt from a self-employed debtor is the issuance of a Subpoena in Aid of Execution. A subpoena is a court order requiring a person to appear at a given place and time and give sword testimony. I subpoena the self-employed debtor to my office to give a post-judgment deposition regarding his or her assets, the business assets and include in the subpoena a requirement that they present the tax returns that they have filed for the previous five (5) years, copies of all bank statements, for all checking, savings accounts they and the business have, copy of any retirement account information and copy of any business records they have. The tax returns can be invaluable, especially when you discover that a self-employed debtor has not filed taxes for a given year or years. During the deposition, my primary focus is asking the self-employed debtor about current work they are performing and who those clients are and how much they are owed. I then issue a Writ of Garnishment the same day to those clients. This requires the people who owe the self-employed debtor money for work he has performed to pay that money into the registry of the court. In this case, this leaves the self-employed debtor performing work and not getting paid for it. Again, these Writs of Garnishment typically do not generate enough cash to satisfy the judgment, but get the attention of the debtor to the point that he or she will do practically anything to satisfy the judgment.