What to Do when Tenant Vacates Early

Today, what we are going to talk about is what happens when you get a phone call from the tenant letting you know that they are vacating the property early, before their lease is up.

Basically, you have two options: One option is that they are legally bound in that property. They did sign a lease agreement and you can hold them to that. Here in the state of Texas, you can make them be responsible for the months of the lease that the unit is vacant until you get the property re-leased. Now, whether you get that money is another question and whether or not they leave the property in good condition is also something else to discuss.

Second option we’ve seen is, sometimes you can ask the tenants to make it in re-leasable condition, ask them if you can start showing the property immediately. See if you can get some interest in the property so you can get it re-leased before they leave. This way you will have minimum down time. Obviously nobody wants the tenant to leave, if you are on good terms with the tenant you can make it more of a win / win. That would probably be the best case scenario in my view.

You do have the right to keep their deposit depending on what your lease says, but that is something you can make into a hybrid solution as opposed to making it something that could be bad. If it’s vacant and they trash the property when they leave, that’s not really good for anybody and that’s never a good scenario. If they are going to leave because they lost their job and they don’t have the money, they know that it’s a bad situation but at least you can get them to help you. They can show the property for you. They can do their best to try to get it leased, and most of the time if you are nice about it and you understand their position, they will help you as well