Tenants “Move Out” without Letting Us know

[Susie Bright]

Hello everybody. My brother and I have a rental home in Los Angeles, CA we inherited from our parents. We had told my tenants first, a young family of one child who had been there for over 7 years, that the home was going to go up for sale in the next few months in case they wanted to make an offer, but that they didn’t have to worry and that we were going to give them two months noticed. All these years we never had any issues with them been late with their payments.

Just 3 days ago my brother phone them to ask if they had talked about it and it they are interested on buying it. They told him that they can’t afford it and that they had been moving out and that more than 80% has been empty out.

My brother told the husband that nobody had given us any noticed at all and that it wasn’t fair since we could had been, either, making plans to sell it and to show it and fixing anything needed. Soon is going to be November. BTW they also had not paid for this month rent at all. It looks as if they were planning to just leave and disappear and instead of paying their due rent they would keep that money as their deposit.

They signed a contract when they moved which it says, they must give us 30 days noticed before moving out. After the 2ndyear we didn’t have any more contracts with them and all rent increase was done via letters or emails. We agree that everything would continue the same as it was on the contract and they agree.

Since we didn’t get any noticed we are now out of rent income for this month and the next one too. Any suggestion?

They signed a contract when they moved which it says, they must give us 30 days noticed before moving out. After the 2ndyear we didn’t have any more contracts with them and all rent increase was done via letters or emails. We agree that everything would continue the same as it was on the contract and they agree.

Since we didn’t get any noticed we are now out of rent income for this month and the next one too. Any suggestion?