Closing duplex in 2 weeks

[Dean Klein]

Hi BPers,

I am closing a duplex in 2 weeks with tenants in place. I have a dilemma that I am looking for advice on. The current owner just signed a new lease with the tenant downstairs for $650.00 per month on a year lease, however the lease has a 45 day termination clause in it. The current market rents are $800-850 for this unit. The new lease goes from August 2021-August 2022. He's been in the unit for a couple years now. I'm not sure if I should just let this guy stay at the current market rent for a year, then either issue notice, or raise the rent. I'd ideally like to raise the rent right away or issue notice to vacate. The rental market here is very low supply, and high demand. I could get new tenants at $850 pretty easily. The current tenant is not the most ideal, he smokes inside, and when I walked through the unit, he had 2 cats that the current owner said he didn't know the guy had. 

Thoughts?