Sister moved into my rental and she is not on the contract. Tenant has a 800 credit score? Should I care?

[James Park]

I recently closed on a new rental property. My new tenant recently divorced (25 years) and moved into my rental property as it is the lowest priced new construction home within the school district her children attends.. She has never been a renter before and recently sold their million dollar mansion from a golf course community near where i live.

My new tenant is a doctor with a perfect credit score, good income, and gave me 2 month security deposit. The only issue i have is that she allowed her sister to move in without my knowledge. She told me that she was there for emotional support for a couple of months, but it seems like she will be staying long term. I have a 4 bed room SFR and my tenant has two teenage kids where one is headed for college next week. Knowing that we attend the same mega church and share the same faith also gave me a little peace. As long as she pays her rent on time and takes care of my property should i not make a big deal out of it? I don't have the need to raise rent, but perhaps i need to put her sister on the contract?

What do you guys think? Is there any action i need to take?

[Matt Devincenzo]

Just tell her for liability reasons you need all adults on the lease and need to screen her sister the same as any other adult. After that do a new lease or just an addendum saying that her sister is now an authorized occupant.

As to the rent increase, if she is paying a fair market rent I wouldn't increase it because of another person. Rent is based on the property type and location not the number of people living there. By changing rent based on number of people you can be walking a fine line of federally protected status since it would fall under "familial status" and could be discrimination. Obviously if you pay utilities then that is a little different since the justification is more people use more utilities.