I had a lot of interest in hearing my story over on the Real Estate Rookie Facebook page regarding my first eviction experience. I know there's a lot of buy-and-hold investors and property managers on the BP forums and Facebook pages that are very well versed in the eviction process, but I thought I'd provide some insight to my own personal experience.

Here's a little back story:

I purchased a 4-unit building (4 1-BR units) in Cincinnati in August. With the property came three existing tenants and one vacancy. Monthly rents were extremely low at only $350 per month, which is way under market. I had an agreement with the seller that I could show the vacant unit during the two weeks before closing. I signed a lease on the 4th unit at $650 per month the day of closing after all paperwork was signed.

This building came with a bit of history with the other three existing tenants, but it was a cash purchase, so I didn't have enough time to work with the seller (agent and investor) to move the existing tenants. Two of the three tenants seemed to be ok. It was odd that I never saw them at the building. After reaching out, I found that they were staying elsewhere due to problems with tenant #3.

After a bit of chit chat with the two tenants, I find out that tenant #3 has a drug abuse problem and repeatedly breaks into the other apartments. To make matters worse, the vacant unit belonged to her grandmother who had passed away in March. The seller had a squatter (family member) in the apartment after the grandmother's passing, so this building

has now become a family affair. Tenant #3's mother was paying her rent...late, every month.

I knew I didn't want to try to make it work with this tenant. All of the tenants were on a month-to-month lease, so I decided it was best to give her a 30-day notice to vacate. I sent it certified mail with delivery receipt, but hand delivery would also have been acceptable.

I was planning on raising the rents in the building anyway, so the other two tenants received a 30-day notice of rent increase from $350 to $650. Both decided it was best to leave as you can imagine.

Back to the eviction...

As the 30-days were approaching, I kept in touch with tenant #3. I always treated her fairly and with respect. We chatted about her move and she assured me that she was moving back in with her mom. I offered to supply her with boxes and packing tape to help with some of the moving costs.

Move-out day comes, no signs of her moving out. Luckily, my realtor had given me an attorney referral. Take it from me, YOU WANT AN ATTORNEY. It was the best $175 I spent to get me through the process.

He supplied me with the 3-day notice to vacate form that complied with the Hamilton County requirements. I posted it on the door of her unit and took a photo for proof. Then I had to wait...three...more...days.

No signs of movement from her, so the attorney started the eviction process. It took two weeks to get a court date, which was surprising given that it's 2020 and with all of the shutdowns due to COVID-19, I expected it to take longer. My court date was set for October 26.

Note that I still treated this tenant with respect even though she was getting evicted. I never had any bad altercations with her. We avoided each other mostly, but I still said hello to her when I saw her. I think it's important to remember that people make choices and sometimes they are not good choices, but these are still people. The rental business is still a customer service business.

So the court date comes and I meet the attorney at court. For eviction hearings, the court gives you a starting time, but there could be multiple cases in front of you. I had to check in with the bailiff and noticed that I was 5th on the list. I brought all of the documents the attorney had advised me to bring, including a copy of all police calls made to the property that year.

The process was fascinating. I'm glad there were other people ahead of me. The judge was very pro-tenant I noticed. It made me extremely nervous. Some evictions were for non-payment of rent, and even without declarations from the CDC, the judge was very much interested in the Landlord and Tenant working out the payment issues in creative ways. It wasn't a hard no to the eviction, but the judge asked a lot of questions on what steps the Landlord took to work with the Tenant before making a decision.

Then there was my case. My tenant did show up to court to contest. My attorney did almost all of the talking. I only spoke if he or the judge asked me a question. We provided all of the documents as evidence. The judge awarded in my favor.

You would think that would be a relief! But there is a 7-day window for the tenant to vacate before they can be forcefully removed. That was the longest 7 days. I did notice her moving things out. She did at some point lock herself out of the apartment and had to break the door to get back in. Oh! Did I mention that the seller didn't require security deposits!

Since there is now a massive hole in the door, I was able to peek in to see if there were still contents inside the apartment. On day 7, I noticed she was not physically staying there anymore, but there were still belongings in the apartment. Per the advice of my attorney, I needed to do a setout. On day 8, I could call the bailiff's office and schedule a setout date. To my luck, day 8 happened to be Election Day and the courts closed at noon. You can only call the bailiff's office in Hamilton County between 1:30-3:30, so no luck getting through. I called again on Day 9 and they did not yet have the writ from the court. They can't execute a setout without the writ. The bailiff told me that they had training the next day and to call on Friday. I was infuriated. I couldn't do anything with repairs or lock changes until AFTER the setout.

Luckily, Friday came around and I was able to get the setout scheduled for the following Monday. The setout process was two bailiffs that came to the apartment, entered first and checked for the tenant or anyone else in the unit. To my avail, no one was there. I had to have 4 people for a 1-bedroom apartment setout for the bailiff to allow it to be done and we had 1 hour to empty the unit. Everything was set outside where the tenant could come back and get anything. The tenant had 24 hours to retrieve the belongings.

She didn't come back. There was a lot of stuff left in the apartment. It cost about $500 for disposal of everything. I had been in this unit several times while the tenant lived there. She kept it nice. Other than the door being destroyed, the tenant purposefully destroyed all of the blinds, dumped rice, confectioner's sugar, and pancake mix everywhere in the apartment (carpets, yuck), and turned the thermostat down on the refrigerator so everything would spoil. Petty things, but no real damage. I had another door already and it cost about $100 in blinds for the apartment to replace due to the large 72 inch front window. I've included some photos so you can see how she left the unit.

Overall, the experience wasn't terrible, but I attribute that to my attorney. If I had to figure it all out myself, it would have been extremely stressful.

Evictions will happen. Don't kid yourself in thinking that they won't. This specific eviction was a result of a tenant inheritance situation, but pre-screening isn't 100% foolproof. Don't want until you need to evict someone to have a process in place, otherwise you will be scrambling.

Hope this experience helps others!