Tenant Threatening Police For Showing - COVID-19 / Coronavirus

[Kevin L.]

Hey BP Family,

I have arguebly the WORST and most disgusting on-time paying tenant but here's the situation:

I rent 3 rooms in a townhouse in Virginia to 3 different parties, essentially a shared living situation.

One tenant is moving out the end of the month as a result of his roommate across the hall and his disgusting habits (that's another story).

The disgusting tenant's lease is actually over the end of the month and a notice of non-renewal was given to him over 3 months ago. However, this tenant is refusing to leave per the Virginia governor's stay at home order but to complicate things, he threatened to call police if I showed up on my rental property and did any showings of any room at the townhouse and claims he called the local police department and they said I would be cited/possibly arrested for violating a stay at home order.

Does any of what he claims even sound right?

Can I legally be denied entry into my rental property period to show a room in which the current tenant moving out end of the month had no issue and with proper notice but another tenant doesn't want me to go in the house?

What if I decided that I was going to take over/start living in the soon to be vacant room? Would I still need to give proper/any notice to enter my house/living quarters or at that point, the disgusting tenant would have no say in me entering the house period?

Thanks in advance for any input.

-Kevin

[Lynnette E.]

Originally posted by @Kevin L.:

@Lynnette E. @Nathan G. Thank you both for your responses. Virginia's governor, for better or worse, didn't state whether real estate was an essential or non-essential business so it's grey area. I went ahead and even contacted my county PD and they said it's up to the district PD on how they respond. I need to contact the district PD still.

I agree with what you said @Nathan G. about trying to follow all the social distancing guidelines and had my one tenant, not been moving out May, I would probably just let it be but there's some urgency now that I'll be losing $700/month on that tenant's room and even though I know people who need rooms, I don't think anyone is going to rent a room from a home when you open the front door, it smells like a dump.

Do either of you know that if my tenant moving out states that my disgusting tenant across the hall is the reason he's moving out due to unsanitary living conditions, garbage in the common areas left by the disgusting tenant, and fear for pest infestation/mold pileup from hoarding of garbage in the disgusting tenant's room as well as expired food left in the refrigerator, would there be any recourse for me to sue the disgusting tenant for that $700/month I'm losing because of him being the reason the other tenant moving out?

I think that it would probably be hard to collect on one  person being cleaner than another.   I have a friend who rents by the room, mostly to military folks, but it might help you knowing how he does it.  He hires a housekeeper who comes in once or twice a week and cleans the common areas.  He pays for that and its included in their rent.  He also encourages them to hire the housekeeper to do their room, which she will do for about $20 more a month that they pay her directly.  It keeps the common areas clean to a certain standard.  She cleans Fridays and Mondays as weekends tend to be party time and by Monday it needs it.  His contract with them states that if they do not vacuum and clean their private room, then he will hire a housekeeper to clean it and she will be given a key to their room and their rent will be increased, and he lists that their private room would be vacuumed/swept, trash removed, no community dishes kept there, etc.   Most just pay the lady to do their room as they do not want to buy a vacuum or broom, etc.  He has it mandatory that the housekeeper do the bathrooms, even for the master as pee left too long on he floor ruins it!

It won't help now, but for new agreements, you may want to think about a change.