Insane Mentally Ill Tenant. What to do?

Question

Hey everyone! I've got an interesting tenant situation on my hands and was looking for some advice.

Some backstory:

I closed on a 4 unit building with 1 inherited tenant. To say she is a hoarder is over simplifying the situation. This woman's apartment is FILLED with "stuff" to the point where you can't even make a clear walkway. Not only that, but her crap has taken up one side of the buildings staircase and hallway. She has mentioned she has 5 storage buildings filled with more stuff as well. My gut told me to boot her when I closed, but the previous landlord said she always paid on time, so I thought I might be able to train her. I was wrong.

This woman is a shining illustration of schizophrenia. She is always telling me that the government is turning on our water, listening to us through the walls and changing the words in our literature. I watched her mark and count all of her rent money because the devil is altering her perception so that 50's look like 20's and vice versa. Her car is covered in tape and spray paint with crazy psalms and sayings on it. Although these things are nutty, they're tolerable. Yesterday was the straw that broke the camels back though.

I've been dealing with a plumbing headache in one of my other buildings, so I went to my 4 unit to grab some pex I've kept in storage. When I got into the basement I heard the terrible sound of water cascading against the floor like a waterfall. I ran deeper into the basement to see a torrent of water spilling down from the rafters. I immediately knew the cause and ran up to her apartment. Upon opening the door, I stumbled upon a pillow, blanket and teddy bear laid out on floor. I had a suspicion as to what that was all about, but I had bigger issues on my hands. She of course answered her door nonchalantly and said that no, no water was on in her apartment but she would look into it. 30 seconds later I hear "oh ****. Those mother****ers". I run in and see the bathroom sink full of water, with the faucet on full blast. I turned it off and immediately started soaking up the water from the floor. When I asked what the hell happened, she said "It's the government Michael! They can turn these things on to screw with your water bill! Those bastards". She then proceeded to rant about the typical insane nonsense that she normally rants about. When I asked about the bed in the downstairs hallway, she said that she's been letting a homeless man sleep there.

I'd like to think I handle myself well under stress and pressure. However, this broke me. I'm evicting her effective right now. What I'm wondering is what to do about obvious case of mental illness. Should I call an institution and report her to someone? Will her obvious state of health make her hard to evict? Is there a way to evict her faster because she is a danger to herself and others? On numerous occasions she has told me she will slaughter anyone who tries to rape her daughter (whom doesn't even live in this state). She has also stated many times that she wishes the good lord would take her away.

I have pictures of everything. There have been reports of her doing crazy stuff around town. She has been arrested and detained in Maryland for resisting arrest. She is dangerous and unpredictable. What should I do?

Vincent V. · Answer

Are you qualify to diagnose your tenant health being? If you're not, don't make it harder on yourself than it needs to be. If she's on a month to month, send her a none renewal notice ASAP. If she violates the terms of the lease, send her a notice to cure the violations or vacate the premise by xyz date. Evict her for the right reasons not because she drives you nut. Your words might be used against you. Good luck!

Thomas S. · Answer

What do your state codes say regarding non renew of lease and justification for eviction. You need the advice of experienced New York state landlords and PMs.She is obviously mentally ill but the question is whether your state regulations allow that to enter into the determination to evict or non renew. Bottom line is you must know and understand the impact of your regulations and would likely benefit from the assistance of a lawyer if you do not have first hand experience with evictions.Regrettably it was extremely naïve of you to not have insisted on vacant occupancy at closing.Your best approach would be to completely ignore her mental state and simply evict based on safety issues related to hoarding. Do not attempt to try and assist simply take a purely business approach and evict. To do otherwise will draw you into her personal situation and drag the process out for months or years. There is no way to help her without negatively impacting your own business. She is not your personal problem she is only your business problem. The faster you can put her on the street, which is not going to be easy, the sooner she will get help. If you attempt to work with her or the authorities to assist her you will make this a extremely long process with one excuse and time extension after another. You need a eviction date and she will need to be physically removed by a sheriff. Do not get involved in assisting her, leave that to others.

Jill F. · Answer

If she is MTM and you are in a state where it is premitted, non-renew without cause. I would also contact her daughter or other emergency contact person and alert them about her 'erratic behavior' and the upcoming non-renewal.

Deanna McCormick · Answer

Sorry, went back and saw you said she's agreed to move.. WAS this in writing, if not get it in writing.

Deanna McCormick · Answer

Call Adult Protection Social Service and report that she is in a horrible state and that you just took over the building and am concern her apartment is both a health and safety issue, next call the health department and ask to speak with the inspector about coming out and looking at this unit. In similar circumstance, we would have unit's like this inspected, inspector would write out order that unit must be in clean and sanitary condition and would give a week for tenant to comply and scheduled a come back visit. If not done we'd be forced to give eviction notice which is basically what you want. Give her notice of inspections, Give her notice all items must be immediately removed out of halls, common areas. She can't store anything thing outside of her apartment. Lease violation. Give her a lease violation for leaving the water turned on and any damages caused from this charge her for write up the date and time you entered and what you saw and took photo's of. For Blocking hallways, for letting vagrant in the building. Stick to your guns, if you have any emergency contact for her call them and ask for help for her in getting her relocated.She is a fire hazard, a security issue if she's permitting vagrants to stay in hallway. Look into the terms of her lease, give her notice of non-renewal as soon as you can if she's on month to month do it today so she knows end of September she's out.Social services should help, but what you need to be-careful of is, if she's committed for mental health issues and put in hospital, and you give her notice to vacate, go to court because she's not out, then your going to have to store that crap for the given number of days per your state law, which would basically be just leaving it in the apartment and then after the storage period getting a dumpster and it all goes out the door.

Wesley W. · Answer

@Michael Ablan If she has a term lease, in my opinion you are going to have an uphill battle trying to evict her for anything other than non-payment of rent. I know Jefferson County leans more right than where I am, but you are still in NYS and under our AG's pro-tenant umbrella.I would start by documenting everything, and going through her lease to find areas where she is violating it. You could try and build a case with enough evidence to go before a judge. You can outline these erratic behaviors as context for the clear lease violations, but as others have said, I would steer away from using any terms (e.g. mentally ill, schizophrenia) that could be used against you as discrimination. I would focus just on her behavior that is breaking the lease, and let the judge decide. Unfortunately, despite your best efforts, it is still going to be a crap shoot whether or not you can get a warrant of eviction.Good luck!

Michael Ablan · Answer

@Jill F. - Unfortunately I signed her onto a year lease, but the fact that she is allowing strangers into the building to sleep in the common area floor is enough grounds to evict. Let alone everything else she has done. @Thomas S. I agree. The only tenant issues I've had thus far have come from inherited tenants. I also agree with handling the situation purely as a business decision. It's the only way to go about this. I asked her to leave yesterday and it went surprisingly well actually. She said ok and then proceeded to tell me about the listening devices in the light bulb she deconstructed. She's been packing up every since. @Vincent V. Good advice. Although it's obvious something is wrong, I'm not a professional so my opinion carries no real weight. Keep my mouth shut and stick to the facts in regards to the rules she has broken. Thank you for the advice.