We own one rental house we have been renting out for 2 years in IL. Our current renter breached her contract numerous times with late payments and having her boyfriend move in with her. We have not charged her late fees and were concerned that she would not be out of the house come June 30, 21. In March, we gave her a "termination of lease" due to wanting to sell our home, giving her a 60+ day notification to be out of home. She signed this form. She continues to say she's having a hard time finding anything to rent, so June 1st, we gave her an "eviction warning," that if she is not out of our rental home by end of lease, we would start the eviction process.
In our lease, we have a "carry over" to month to month, where tenant has to pay double rent if they do not leave when the lease in over. She has now not paid us for July and continues to say she has no where to go and has not left (she has family in town and we know of open apartment buildings). We believe she is lying to us about not having other options, and her boyfriend supposedly has an apartment. Her job has not been affected by COVID. We made a mistake in allowing her to rent from us with a very low credit score; but she had a long story about a divorce and working on getting it back up so we made an exception. Currently living in the home are 3 adult children (19+), herself and now her boyfriend (who is not on the lease). Do we need to pursue eviction for each person because they are all adults? Is there anyway we can hurry this process along? Or what forms we should be giving her? We are new landlords and want out; we want to sell our home and get it on the market and just want them out and feel helpless. She has lied to us a lot; and our second home is 5 homes down from where we currently live, so it's frustrating seeing them drive by everyday with no signs of moving out.
In our lease, we also have that she will be responsible for all attorney fees. We are a single income family with 4 young kids, not make a lot of money. We rely on that payment to pay our mortgage, so we cannot realistically pay attorney fees as well. Has anyone had a similar situation where eviction needed to be pursued and rental contract has tenant responsible for fees? ANY helpful advice in how to proceed?!
