Change when rent is due to help tenant?

[Jonathan Sher]

Hello BP friends,

I wanted your opinion on this situation. I have a tenant in one of my properties. She moved in on Sept 16th of this year so she has only been a tenant for roughly 2 months. She has been a great tenant so far. Her November rent was due on the 1st and she was late. I talked to her that day and she said her direct deposit doesn't come in until the 4th. She gave me a check today with the applicable lates fees. She said that is just how her employers payroll works. Now my question is, since she has been a good tenant, and is very transparent, would you change her rent due date by 3 days due to her direct deposit date? I see this as a kind gesture on my part, I know I can make more money by having her pay late fees, but I feel like if she is a good tenant (taking care of the property, paying rent with transparency on this latest issue)I could "help" her out.

thoughts? I've heard the expression "if you give someone an inch, they will take a mile".

Thanks!~

[Jon Holdman]

Here in CO you can't post the pay or quit until the 5th if the rent is due on the first. I give tenants a small incentive to pay on the 1st or sooner (yes, that does happen once in a while), but its not late until the 5th. In this particular case there would be no late fees if she paid on the 4th.

I have had similar situations,though. What I did was to add a couple of days to the grace period and increased the late fee. So, rent was on time if paid by the 6th, but the late fee was higher if not.

If its more than a couple of days I would change the lease terms (I only do month to month) to have it run from, say, the 10th to the 10th. They would need to pay one third of a months rent on the first of the month when the switch was made then a full month's rent on the 10th. From then on the rent is due on the 10th, late on the 15th.