All Forum Posts by: Walt Dockery

A 3yr lease option is a terrible idea. 

Get them up to or at least close to market rate now or turn the units over at market rate. 

I would ask them if they want to move out a few days early and would prorate the rent if so, but if they don’t take that I wouldn’t sweat it. I would probably list the last week of Sep as IME the better tenants are looking a month or so out.  Some tenants are flexible on start date. I just had the same situation, old lease ended July 31 and I listed late June, found someone flexible and new lease started August 3 to give me a couple days to get it cleaned. 

I own two large dogs. Two large dogs can and IME will turn grass to mud very quickly just from running around on it, particularly for smallish yards.  If there was grass when they moved in it was probably the two dogs running on it that tore it up. 

I would probably offer to let them out of the lease, and in the future not rent to people with large dogs if the yard isn’t set up for it.  Putting some type of hardscaping in the high traffic areas can help. 

Agreed, my first thought was why would you cancel the open house if their background check hasn’t checked out yet????

Why are you taking a security deposit from them before background check came back?

You are getting way ahead of yourself. Read the ultimate guides to renting your house and screening stickied at the top of the forum. 

you mentioned it’s a bathtub/shower ... is it possible this is just an inability to correctly use the shower curtain?

If doing additional move in costs, rather than collecting 2x the security deposit I would collect last months rent if you aren’t doing so already. First month, last month, and security deposit to move in. That last months rent protects you somewhat in the event they need to break the lease.  

I definitely would not do a 2yr lease, that is less attractive to you than 1yr not more, and I certainly would NOT offer or agree (handshake or otherwise) to not raise the rent at the end of that year. 

It’s definitely nice to have when the place is vacant between tenants etc. As to whether tenants want it / use it / will pay extra for it / won’t cause lots of false alarms I think is a crapshoot, some appreciate and use stuff like that some won’t. 

Yes, they have my address as it is listed as my mailing address on my lease, I don’t want to bother with a P.O. box.  My rental is owned under my name and self managed, and if you own your own home under your name, it would take all of 10 seconds to find your address online in most counties anyway.

Security through obscurity is almost always a superficial / feelgood / ineffective means of protecting yourself. If someone wants your address they can and will easily find it. I’m not saying you should post it publicly for everyone to see or anything, but if you have business dealings under your own name I don’t see any benefit to pretending your address is secret.  If I had lots of units I’d probably use LLCs and a P.O. box but wouldn’t delude myself into thinking that makes my physical location impossible or even difficult to find. 

Read the ultimate guides to screening and renting your house stickied at the top of this forum. 

I use TransUnion’s mysmartmove for the background and credit checks. 

The guides above have a free application, BP also has a more detailed application you can buy along with a lease and other docs. Zillow has a free application you can use, cozy.co has an application you can use etc.   

I second using closet or “passage” knobs/handles for all doors and have deadbolts on all exterior doors. The in knob/handle locks are only good for locking yourself out.