Tenant behavior...I cannot compute!

[Shazia Chiu]

Hi BP. My husband and I own a fourplex and our neighbor/tenant has been paying rent later and later each month since she signed her lease in May. She is honestly not someone we would have rented to if we'd had control over the situation (it's a long story, but we basically inherited her as a tenant upon closing). But she is generally nice and is quite handy; we've had a good relationship with her despite her late payments. This month it seems clear that this tenant is not intending to pay rent. Like usual, she made excuses and kept telling us she'd get it to us on Tuesday, or on Thursday, etc. etc., but over the last few days she totally stopped responding to texts, calls and knocks at her door. We can't tell if she's gone because there are always people coming in and out of her place. We put an eviction notice on her door, but at the end of the three days we didn't follow through (I know, I know) because we wanted to see if we could work it out. We called her multiple times, texted her and tried to find her in person. We offered her cash for keys and she never responded. Yesterday we instructed our attorney to move forward with the eviction process, and he'll be working on that come Monday. So here's my question...have any of you had tenants go totally MIA when they realize an eviction is imminent? Should we be doing more to get ahold of her? At this point should we just move forward with the eviction and deal with whatever that will entail? From a legal standpoint is there anything else we ought to be doing at this point to strengthen our case if this ends up in court? We have a signed lease with the main tenant, but like I said earlier I'm not sure if there are other people living with her. It just seems so weird to me that a person would avoid their landlord in a situation like this, but this is my first eviction, so I'm sure I have a lot to learn. Thanks in advance for your insights!