Tenant bailed, what do I do?

[Allen Humphries]

I have a 3 bedroom property outside of St. Louis Missouri where I rent to college students. I currently have 3 girls who signed separate contracts in the unit. One of the tenants has disappeared and left the other two in the unit. The two that are left there are saying they shouldn’t be responsible for the remaining part of the rent. What can I do? Can I hold the one that left responsible? Are the other two liable for the rest of the rent? Please help! Thanks in advance!

[Kyle J.]

If you have separate leases with each of them (I'm assuming that's what you meant when you said you have "3 girls who signed separate contracts"), then they might be right.

Ideally, you'd have just one lease with each of them named in that lease, with them being jointly and severally liable for the total amount of the rent.  So if the total rent due was $900, then all you'd care about was that you got the $900.  You would care if each of them paid $300 or one of them paid $900.  They're all responsible for making sure it gets paid, and they're all responsible if it doesn't.

However, if I'm understanding your post correctly, it sounds like you might have separate leases for each of them in which they're only responsible for their portion of the rent.  So if the total rent for the unit is $900, it sounds like you might have a lease with each of them for $300.  If that is the case, then I'd agree with the two remaining tenants in that they shouldn't be held responsible for the rent owed by the third tenant who skipped out since you have a totally separate agreement with that person.  You'd need to go after that third tenant for that money.

Hard to say for certain though since none of us have read the leases, but that's my best guess based on what's posted.