All Forum Posts by: Michael Gefvert

The CARES act is unclear on that point.  You should have an attorney look over your situation and the law for specific advice.  Dayton is not a cost effective area for me.

Its 30 days notice to cure if the tenant breaches one of the statutory tenant duties. 3 days for a breach of the lease not covered by that section.  Your tenant smoking in the unit is a 3 day matter, being loud and disorderly is 30 notice to cure.  

Is your property covered by a conventional mortgage? There's a federal moratorium on evictions on any property with a Freddie or Fannie loan in place, among other fed programs.

How much time was left on the lease term?

Changing the locks would be considered a self-help eviction under Ohio law and would expose you to paying your tenant's costs in finding alternative housing as well as his attorney's fees.  ORC 5321.15.

In Ohio, a tenant who wins a security deposit dispute is entitled to double the amount wrongfully withheld and attorney fees.  It sounds like you have a good case based on the limited information provided, you can probably find an attorney who will do this for free with the expectation of recovering fees from the property owner.

Bonus: you don't have to learn any civil procedure.

Crowd-sourcing legal advice from non-lawyers is rarely advantageous.  I was surprised at the conclusion reached by Nathan that you'd owe interest on a deposit if you held it more than 6 months.  Then I went to the NOLO link, and was even more surprised to see how bad their summary of Ohio law is regarding security deposits.  I'm not sure I want to even check on how bad it may be regarding anything else.  

I'm obviously biased towards retaining a professional to help you in matters like this because it is how I make my livelihood. Note that I said livelihood, as in, I follow developments in landlord/tenant law for a living. You can read the statutes yourself (you linked to the applicable one here) and you can read guidance as it comes out from HUD, etc. You can probably do this while juggling another job if you are so inclined. But even if you do these things, you are going to miss out on a huge chunk of the law in court decisions applying the statutes. These are not as readily available as the statutes (searchable databases require subscription fees) and require some expertise to efficiently find applicable decisions. I would suggest that you should learn the basics, and I can tell you are trying to do so through your original question, but I'd consider linking up with someone who deals with exactly these sort of issues for a living. It isn't going to cost you an arm and a leg (just a finger or two) and you'll probably end up saving money by not following bad legal advice from strangers.

What effort are you referring to in the OP?

***This is not legal advice, it is general information to orient you to Ohio landlord-tenant law.  If you would like legal advice applicable to your unique circumstances, you'll need to contact an attorney.***

Most leases have a provision that extends the term of the lease on a month-to-month basis after the original term expires.  Month-to-month leases require one month's notice to terminate.

If a lease does not extend to a month-to-month tenancy, a tenant who holds possession after the lease's expiration is a hold-over tenant.  

Ohio law treats these situations differently.

The recorder should have mortgages that are filed against real property.  When I go to check this, the first place I go is the auditor website (ours is easier to search than the recorder) to see whether the tax bill mailing address is to a bank.  If it is, there's almost certainly a mortgage on the property.  If the mailing address is not a bank, I go to the recorder to dig deeper.

A coil stove is certainly easier to clean and has lower maintenance costs since you can just change out the pans and coils as needed... but it looks out of place in a high end rental.  Prior to owning my home I lived in a number of apartments at different price points and not one of the high end ones had a coil stove.  

I'd steer clear of a jacuzzi tub.  They have a tendency to get really nasty if not used regularly and would be more trouble than its worth in a rental I would think.