03.01.14 Worst Yet Move Out

Here documents our worst move out yet. The tenant owes us close to $5,000.

We did a routine maintenance inspection for the tenant’s one year anniversary in early January. We determined at that point that the tenants had been hard on the unit (removed most doors, removed ceiling fans, trashed blinds, replaced kitchen fixtures with lower quality, kids drawing on walls) but that they hadn’t completely destroyed it (no holes in walls, new kitchen still intact, etc.). [We missed the fact that the bathroom floor was completely wrecked with water damage.] They had been shaky tenants since right after move in, so we decided to “ride them out”, see how long we could keep them, knowing it would be expensive when they moved out.

It wasn’t even a few days later when the tenants announced that they had lost their main job. They had a relative come forward and offer to pay part of their rent for several months, but the co-sign agreement never came back signed. We posted three days, set up and broke payment plans, and prepared to file our first eviction. We didn’t think keys for cash would be effective, but we did get to let their rent obligation stop the day they moved out. At this point, anything to get them off the property.

We took possession a few days before the end of January. This photo shows how it looked at that time. They did come back for two more days to remove items. They threw a significant number of belongings into the alley, resulting in the city to wanting to fine us $500 for the mess.

We had a $750 deposit, representing one month rent before the pass through utilities. Their rent default with late fees ate up all the deposit. The place was so awful that we invested almost 28 hours of personal and paid cleaning time. And a few thousand in repainting the entire house (not a wall without crayon scribbling; the house had been repainted a year ago), gutting and replacing the bathroom flooring, re-carpeting (all carpet was pet urine soaked), and fixing the other items they destroyed.

Key learnings: We were firm with them when they weren’t paying on time or taking care of the outside of the property, but I think this experience will cause us to be even more vigilant. But a lot of it goes back to screening. They were new college students getting their aid payments quarterly. We now take points away for that; in our area people start college and don’t last long, and quarterly payments are problematic. We are also more inclined to want to try to get into the applicants current residence to see if they are slobs. If the applicants have pets that need to be approved, just offering to come to them has gotten us access. And a red flag if someone is moving from an apartment to a SFR. These tenants did not make the transition well at all.