All Forum Posts by: Ben S.

Thank you for your input @Greg Scott, I do have camera's on the laundry and I do know 100% it is these tenants and when I told them to stop with the grease clothes before they said they washed his work clothes at his parents, so they admitted it was them.  So I have no doubt it was them.  They are not horrible tenants I don't mind them at all, they have been there about 2.5 years.

I am not the type of landlord to stay out of this because I truly care about the damage and frustration this is causing for my other tenant. 

I was thinking that I could maybe ask the the the tenants to pay the other tenant $50-$100 for the damaged clothes.  Or do you think that would cause too many issues between the tenants?  They are both pretty reasonable tenants that understand stuff happens...

I've had a tenant in a 4-plex who has his laundry destroyed with grease all over his clothes. We suspected it was from another tenant who was a mechanic and I warned them that they needed to stop washing his work clothes in the washer but we are on occurrence #4 now what should I do?  I installed a brand new speed queen washer that cost over 2,000 to make sure it wasn't the washer causing the grease and here we are with the same issue.

Should I give them a fine?  

Should I have them buy new clothes for the tenant who lost clothes because of it?

Should I ban them from using the machines?

They claim they have been washing his work clothes at their parents but obviously that's not actually happening...

@Michael Baum

Thank you for the recommendation. I already have a handyman or two and I'm looking into get some better cleaners. Thank you for reminding me to check the laws in the area. I have talked with them and I know short-term rental is possible in this area and that shouldn't be a problem at all.

I heard of some other services like guestly. I've already used AirDNA to research, what other similar properties are getting in the area. Does anybody have a recommendation for pricing service to use? I'm looking to automate as much of the process as I can using these services like Guestly.

Looking for recommendations on what processes to put in place, services to hire people to find and the overall best way to launch this property. I have a fair amount of long-term rentals near this location and I live about 25 minutes from the location. I plan to manage most of it myself initially.

Here is a little overview of the property we are about to purchase.

We just got an accepted offer on a short-term rental that is an extremely unique and luxurious property just outside Minneapolis St Paul area. This property is on 2 acres on a bluff overlooking the St Croix River. It actually has two different buildings. One of the buildings has an indoor pool and will have an outdoor hot tub. It is near a very popular ski area and very close to the river with amazing scenic overlooks.

This property has never been a short-term rental in the past. As far as I know. We have the capability to rent each property separately and also rented all together. It was sold as four bedrooms but I can very easily make it six bedrooms and with and egress window. We can make it seven bedrooms. Five bedrooms in the main house and two bedrooms in the pool house.

I have a little experience in short-term rentals using Airbnb and VRBO because I rented out a property in northern Wisconsin around 2016 but a lot has changed since then. I was a super host at that time so I'm wondering if it is beneficial for me to use that same account on Airbnb?

@Ludmila M. Wow that is very interesting. I'm guessing that it is a relatively new law. Minnesota's was started in in 2021. And the law states three months in our state but when talking to a lawyer basically they say the next three months are still in play. It is incredibly disappointing because the tenants can very much manipulate this to stay longer as long as they don't violate any lease terms. Definitely don't listen to the property management guy on this thread. You absolutely cannot ask them to leave even if they're on a monthly lease or their yearly lease is up. He has no idea what he's talking about. So what that means is the tenant really has a lot more power.

I self-manage 21 units in 9 buildings most of which are near me.  My main goal for property management software is to automate as much as possible.  I'm willing to pay extra for more automation of the management.  I started 3 years ago using RentRedi but didn't really like it much, then I switched to TenantCloud for the for the last 2 years.   I'm researching other software and trying to figure out what one will allow me to automate as much as possible. 

My current top choice is DoorLoop because they have the ability for API access so I can use zapier to do some automation but they also lack in many other ways compared to TenantCloud.  I don't like to do anything on paper that includes things like the welcome letter and move-in checklist and obviously the lease agreement.  Tenant cloud allows me to send a move-in checklist that can be filled out electronically, and the welcome letter is mostly filled out automatically but I can't automate the sending of the letter. 

DoorLoop won't let me import any expenses so that is a big fail for me which requires me to run all of my accounting in Quickbooks still.   So really right now I haven't found something that will work for me yet but I'm still in the hunt any suggestions?

@William Coet I was told by a city inspector for this city that follows the international standards that every room intended for human comfort has to be keep at 68 degrees 3 ft above ground in the middle of every room.  Unfortunately, that's all the code says, it is very vague.  I have had electric baseboard installed and that seems to have resolved the issue.

That code is that he referenced I think is here: https://codes.iccsafe.org/s/IB...

The fact that the tenants can do things that cause the temp to drop is the part where the the property manager will grow grey hairs because the tenants can cause serious harm to the manager here.  They can keep doors closed, or crack windows, or intentionally take plastic off windows, or intentionally cause the heat to turn off before the authorities show up to take measurements.

Quote from @Jason Maguire:

Hey @Ben S.

I've unfortunately been in a similar situation with one of my boilers just last winter. Had a 5-year-old boiler that was relatively brand new, and the pilot light kept randomly blowing out in the middle of the night. Got like 5 calls over the course of 15 days that there was no heat. Would go over re-light it and it would then work fine. Had 4 different HVAC companies over who replaced the gas valve, cleaned the boiler, replaced the pilot, and more, but the issue kept persisting.

I ended up just replacing the boiler as the "HVAC Professionals" couldn't figure it out and we couldn't keep going without heat & was worried if there would be complaints if it wasn't fixed. It was frustrating because it wasn't an old boiler and the only issue seemed to be the pilot which is a very quick light with a BIC Grill lighter. But at some point, tenants won't take a band aid fix or an "HVAC guy says there's nothing wrong with it" for an answer, especially if it keeps happening.

My question to you, do you have a string of texts/ emails or any communication with the tenant showing you were actively working the problem? I would think her complaint would be invalid if you were actively trying to solve the problem & have the communication with both the tenant and HVAC company to prove it? 

If that's the case, then to James's point, her "complaint" would be invalid, and you would think you'd be able to either evict or non-renew her lease at that point without any backlash. But from the original post it's hard to tell what he specific complaint actually was. Was it you didn't fix the heat in a timely manner, or was it that the room doesn't stay at a set temp? Only reason i ask, is I've never heard of a heating system turning off because there is a space heater next to it.

I track the temperatures in each unit and graph them out and they are within reasonable ranges that are HIGHER than what I keep my own house at.  The original tenant's complaint was heating since then they haven't complained again and since then I have told them I'm not renewing their month-to-month lease for MANY other reasons not related to the heat issue.  To which they have filed a retaliation claim.  The original issue was that tenant was running a space heater near the thermostat that controls the boiler so the thermostat was saying 78 degrees and it was set at 71 so therefore the boiler wouldn't turn on because the thermostat wouldn't call for heat.  This original tenant has been trying to get all 3 tenants to lie and go against me which I have proof of from the 1 tenant that doesn't want to play their games. 

One of the other tenants went with it and is now going after me for cooler rooms even though her living room is kept at 71 degrees and the radiators are working in all rooms their rooms are cooler because they have windows and the doors are kept shut.  So after she notified me she was filling an emergency order within 24 hours I installed plug-in baseboards to help keep their rooms warm and they are mad because they have to pay for electricity for those.  And they say the living room is now 62 which is also a lie. 

I have full intentions to install new windows but that can't be done in the middle of winter obviously.  I also plan to make some other major updates that I'm coordinating with HVAC people but that takes time.  But the fact is they have sufficient heat currently but continue to attack me with lies and everything they can possibly think of.  So it's very obvious the 2 tenants are not happy so should probably find another place to live.  I've only asked the 1 original tenant to leave so far though.

Quote from @Nathan Gesner:

I'm just not buying it. If you were obeying the law and abiding by the lease, you would have a solid case and the attorneys would be on your side. The reason their not is because you did something wrong. If attorneys won't accept your cash and represent you, then there's nothing we can do for you, either.

hmmm, did you actually read this post?  No idea where you think attorneys are not on my side.  They a 100% fully on my side and said that this would be no problem in court at all because all of the claims both tenants have submitted have zero validity in court.  The reason I originally created this post was to point out the failure of the MN laws that inhibits my ability to NOT renew a month to month lease for up to 6 months just because they have complained.  They could complain about anything and if I want to "not renew" their MTM lease in the next six month's they can claim retaliation.  I can easily evict them if they violate the lease but that's not the point.

Quote from @Mary Jay:

Quote from @Ben S.:

Quote from @Carini Rochester:

Sometimes the most difficult messages to hear are also the most helpful. @James Hamling 's reply is difficult to hear. But, is there anything in it that's helpful? In my opinion read what he said, find something of value and disregard the rest. I think there is a lot to disregard, but at least a kernel of truth to learn from. Analyze your repair and maintenance practices. Do you need to find a better HVAC contractor?

I wish you well.

Thank you for the note Carini but it's very hard to fix something that isn't really broken... 3 licensed boiler professionals all agree it is working as it should be. Every time I enter the unit it feels warm, I have been logging the temperatures in all 4 units since this occurred back in December and the temperature in the living room of each unit has been above the required limit of 68, and most of the time above 71. In MN when it gets super cold outside you may have a few rooms that get cooler because of windows, this happens in my 8-year-old house also. I have supplied the tenants with plastic to put over the windows to reduce this effect. I have plans to install new windows so plastic isn't needed in the future. For the tenants that can't handle the few degrees of temperature drop in their rooms, I have supplied extra electric baseboard heaters. But yet here I am with tenants the insist on attacking me in every possible way they can.

 We all are learning, don’t get offended by negative statements. I agree with the previous person who said to raise the rent. I would raise the rent significantly (not just 3 percent, May be 20 percent. But make sure the rent is still within the acceptable fair market value range)…

But I would prefer a different approach if it was me. I would tell the tenant that I don’t want to renew the lease and give them 500$ for keys/relocation fee

Thank you @Mary Jay I may try going down that route of paying her but unfortunately I did her a huge favor because she was homeless for awhile before this because nobody would accept her.  So I fear that is going to be the case going forward.  I obviously have learned a huge lesson here to not let emotions get the best of me when accepting people.  No good deed goes unpunished...  Regarding raising rent that is most definitely not allowed within 3-6 months because she filed a complaint and it would fall into the crappy MN retaliation law.