How do you handle a lease violation?

It’s one of those things that a lot of people don’t like to think about. They don’t like to talk about it. They just kind of put their hand in the sand, and they hope and pray that it never happens. The reality is, yes, there’s always good things with owning rental properties, but there are bad things. The bad things only get worse when you ignore them.

If you have a tenant that is violating the lease, you have an obligation to enforce that lease agreement. One of the things you have to remember is you’re running a business, and you want to protect your asset. Part of protecting your asset is enforcing the lease agreement. Now you really want to be careful if you choose not to enforce the lease agreement and the tenant violates the lease, you could actually be considered voiding the contract because you did not perform the way the lease agreement states.

Just by being a nice person, you’re actually putting yourself in a bad situation. I recommend take emotions out of it. Very simple. If the tenant does something or doesn’t pay the rent or doesn’t do anything, make sure treat it like a business. All you do is follow the procedure. Don’t take it emotionally.

If you have to evict the tenant, it’s not the worst thing in the world; but again, you want to be very diplomatic about it. You want to be very professional. Send them the proper notification that needs to be sent, and make sure that they realize that if they are in violation, then they have to rectify that violation or you will no longer do business with them, meaning you will have to evict them.

Again, lease violations are not the scariest thing in the world; but if you ignore it and you don’t handle it correctly, it can become something very bad. Again, this is Steve Rozenberg with Empire Property Management. Give us a call. 888-866-6727. I’d be happy to talk with you, see if investing is the right thing for you, see if you’d like some help with your current properties, or maybe you’d like some help making some acquisitions on some new properties. We’d be glad to help you. Take a look at us online. We’ll talk to you then