Court systems are there to mediate.  

This is what I did and while that was working it's way through the legal system, I began working on the tenant and eventually went to court but by that point, we had come to an agreement, so all we had to do was go into a room with a mediator and give them the details of the agreement, which in my case was forgiveness of the 1.5 months of back rent and I threw in some cash to help him move.The problem with taking general advice with evictions is that these things then to be very state and city specific, so what might work in one area could be problematic in another.

In Texas, you would head to mediation first, not lawsuits.

A petition with the SFRB and a mediation meeting with the ALJ that reviews the validity of the rental increase would resolve this with the only out of pocket cost being your time wasted.The real potential cost is what was discussed earlier around the eviction moratorium, court closures and anticipated backlog of filings and cases.

It’s only been 2 months.I can’t figure out what is motivating the guy to behave in this manner.He’s started avoiding me (which is fine, because I’m anti-confrontational and I'm quite angry right now), but I think we probably need to sit down and have a chat to get this to stop.The property code inspector actually recommended that I seek out a mediator to help deal with the guy because he's been repeatedly calling him about the violations.Would you cut bait and run?

Because she was a reasonable person and actually ended up being a good mediator. 

Court-ordered mediation (required in most of the country pre-trial) will cost you another $2,500-$3,000 in fees to draft the brief and attend in person mediation.  

Then, worst case, they send you to mediation and maybe, just maybe you're told you have to rent to that person - who, in the meantime, found somewhere else to live.I wouldn't hire a lawyer until some action has been taken against you.  

@Michael Gabin - Not sure what city your duplex is in, but in San Francisco we have a nonprofit that helps resolve conflicts between tenants (among others, like LL/tenant and even relative vs relative) using friendly mediation.

They normally only take cases that are pretty severe and obvious cases of discrimination.So, the odds of any applicant ever actually suing you are slim to none.And if you act in a fair manner, and have reasonable criteria for your tenants and your advertisements aren't overtly racist, you're probably never going to have any claims or lawsuits brought against you.And, even if someone was to get a fair housing lawyer involved, they are probably going to want to mediate a resolution that would be fair.You're always better off to just say a tenant doesn't meet your criteria than let someone in you're not comfortable with, or someone who is trying to bully their way into your unit.