Alright, I am right in the middle of my first eviction. My lawyer seems to be doing most of the work; he has filed the eviction, gotten the writ of restitution, hired the movers and the sheriff. So far the fee is $639 ($350 is a deposit to the movers) plus the $900 worth of rent the tenant owes. Obviously I have many many questions, but I have narrowed it down to a few.
I liked going through my lawyer because its been practically no work for me, but is it better to do this process yourself? So far I see no lawyer fees and it seems like he is going to try to get that from the tenant.
Speaking of fees, how does the recovery for damages owed work? Is it likely that I will see any of this money? Is the tenant going to pay me on a monthly basis? They didn't have enough money to pay rent how are they going to pay the damage owed?
Why did you hire movers? I just did an eviction yesterday. The tenants decided to wait until the last hour to start moving out. Right in front of the 2 police officers, I walked in and said, "nothing of value left behind in this house. Everything goes to the dump." The two guys outside were loading up their car with the last few things the police let them take out, and that was the end of it. My guy started changing the locks.
I don't know how evictions are run in your state, but I'm not paying for any movers.
@Hernan B.,
Evictions are fun, aren't they, said no one ever. I had to do my first eviction about two years ago. I can offer you my experience with this topic, but please keep in mind that we are in different states and the laws and local customs of how an eviction is conducted may be different.
My first eviction probably could have been avoided. My problem started with the property management company I hired to lease up the rental unit. In hind sight, I feel they did a very poor job of screening the tenant. This is probably to some extent my fault for doing enough homework on them before I hired them, and I learned an expensive lesson from that.
The tenant moved in and brought a pit bull that was not disclosed on the application. I found out due to a noise complaint from another tenant. Her dog really messed my unit up, causing about $2000 of damage by the time I evicted her.
I hired a attorney to handle the eviction for me, and I recommend doing that way do to he time saved. The attorney handled everything after the 3 day notice. He obtained a judgement for the amount of the damages and unpaid rent. In our area, the landlord/owner pays for the attorney to evict.
Oh yeah, after I told the tenant she had to get rid of the dog and pay for the damages, she stopped paying rent!!!
The eviction took just over 30 days. I have since placed her account in collections and pursued wage garnishment. I have not seen a dime.
I now use a different company to lease up those units, and have not had any problems with my tenants. Much can be avoided in the tenant selection process.
I little more than you probably wanted, but I hope it is helpful.
I have very little experience with attorneys. Mostly just to review legal documents. All were very aggressive about getting paid. My point, if your attorney does not get paid by the tenant, I am guessing you will become the source for payment. After all, you are the one who hire the tenant.
In many cases, tenants have no money to pay rent plus all the extras you seek in a court eviction and resulting judgement. I would not count on receiving money from the tenant. If you do, based on my experience and conversations with other long-term investors, consider it a rare occurrence.
I always handle evictions myself. Very seldom does it become necessary to escalate the process to the legal system. I politely ask the tenant to leave and most times they do. I give them time to vacate and we all move on. No demands for more money or the back rent owned. We just all move on. This process is generally much faster and more economical. The cash flow resumes much faster and I have never had a tenant take revenge on the property. And I did not make a Benz payment for the attorney.