All Forum Posts by: Mary Young

So glad to find this!

I have called many collection agencies, seven, and they do not service landlords?!! One company told me they get 10-15 calls a day from landlord. So I am very surprised there are not a lot of companies would collect for landlords.

Also thinking of using Rent Recovery Services. On another post there is a Yelp review on this company and was not great. Anyone out there has success with Rent Recovery Services or other agencies?

I came across several collection companies mentioned on www.multifamilyinsiders.com and will need to check out if they work with individual landlord -

Landlord Doctor
Rent Recovery Service
Hunter & Warfield - www.huntwar.com
Vista Financial Solutions
Federated collection bureau in Atlanta
Rent collect global

Sue, thank you very much for your opinion and analysis. My husband agrees with you and suggests we should go find a new tenant just to avoid future issues this person may create.

I do appreciate the recommendations and reminders to caution me not to violate any Fair Housing rules.

The reason I posted the question is not because I to take advantage of families or single person with children. ALL the renters I had in the past have children and pets. 

I never had this situation arises for an applicant to add extra occupants AFTER I accepted the application that listed one occupant. My last tenant allowed extra family members, three more people, to live there, and I was advised to notify them they broke the lease and they needed to be checked, added to the lease, and with extra rent.

Please provide me a feedback to my initial question: May I keep the Hold Interest Fee if the tenant refuses to sign the contract. I think he now changed his mind to rent the place and at the lease signing he will nitpick the contract. I probably will not remove any stipulation then he can ask for his non-refundable fee back. I really cannot afford to lose any month's rent.

After reading all the discussions additional questions come up for me -
1. Can an applicant change the number of occupants after Landlord's acceptance?  Yes or No
2. Does it make any difference to Landlord's rights to increase the rent if the additional accupants are related or not related? a) Yes, Landlord can change the amount if they are roommates. b) No, Landlord cannot change the amount if they are related or not related.

Lew, thank you so much for pointing that out, as I thought I do have the right to charge for extra occupant(s).

Call me superstitious, I went and smudged(clear out stagnant energy and let the high vibration remain) my rental the other night.

Apologize for my grammar! I have too many things to juggle right now.

It has been a challenge this time around with this rental. The rental should have be completed and ready for move in a month ago. It all started with us using a 'highly' recommended property management from my husband's co-worker who manages his 20 something rentals. This company's quote was close to the other ones I got, we selected this PM to do the painting and flooring was to build a relationship, and for us to increase rentals, and for her to manage. The owner of this PM company collected 1/3 of the deposit. Not only did her painter did a low quality work, two weeks late with the painter showed up when he liked, not more than 1/4 of the work done, she told us to get another painter when I sent her photos of the work. She contradicted herself all over the place and blamed everything on me. Right now not only she would not give me partial refund on the paint job, full refund on the flooring installation, she said she is going to bill us for the 'extra' work her painter had done. - - - This is a separate issue and did not think I should include in the original post. I was going to post this on a separate discussion to find out what I can do about this situation. It is a financial drain to have it empty for two months. I also do rather wait for a more qualify tenant than to take anyone.

During that time frame two out of seven applicants' credit were good. The one who said he need it ASAP we could not rent to because of the delay in painting and flooring. So we accepted this person ( single person, good income, good credit, no pets and non smoker). even though the move-in date is 5/1st. We do need to make up the lost time and spend the required time to do a quality work. This is the reason the we accepted him. I thought we were following the proverb of 'Better to have a hen tomorrow than an egg today'. Hmmm....maybe I should let this one go and find another tenant.

Yes. He did sign the application that clearly indicated the Holding Deposit is non-refundable.

One more thing to point out - he said he would commit to a two years term; his brother and his daughter to a one year term.

Thank you all so much for your comments and suggestions.

I like to clarify that he said he would consider a two years lease PRIOR to me accepting his non-refundable Holding Interest Deposit. The reason I asked for a two years lease is because he could not move in immediately, and I agree to keep the unit empty for two months and 1 week.

I did not change the term, he did. He wanted to add more people weeks after I accepted his application and deposit. His application was for one person and not for three people.

My husband friend set a $400pp increase. So I thought $100pp is more reasonable. 

Back to my question - Holding Interest Deposit still non-refundable if tenant refuse to sign lease?

Accepted an applicant and received a non-refundable Holding Interest Deposit for my rental. I asked if he would consider a two years lease and he said he would after he inspect the maintenance repairs.

He did an interim walk-thru while the work is half way completed with his brother. Beforehand he told me his brother and his brother’s young daughter will live with him for a year. I told him his brother will need to go through the same credit and background check, and along with an increase of the rent for one year. After the one year term with his brother moving out I can revert the rent back to the original rent amount. He did not want an increase at first and then he offered $90.

I am thinking $200 more and since I had never done such lease contract before I had to do some research. Before I could even give him a reply he called and told me he was not interested to rent the place any more because the rent is too high. He threatened to go to a lawyer to collect his non-refundable hold deposit. Within 15mins he called back and said he would rent the place.

My first question is if he would not sign the lease because of any one thing on the contract can I still keep the Holding Interest money?

My second question is if he agrees to the rent increase for the extra people for one year, how to go about handling the lease agreement.

Thank you all in advance to assist me with this situation.

-Mary