But, doing this, and being clear that this is their one and only one-time pass, put the kabash on asking me again.The only exception to that that I made, was for students who relied on their financial aid as their only source of income to pay the rent, etc.  

The "cost" of vacancy is an operating expense and should be borne by the enterprise as a whole, from reserved funds for that purpose. 

A couple of my student tenants were living on their financial aid, and I did let them pay rent late if their FA checks were running late (which I would get them to verify with a letter from the FA office).  

So, you don't have to give her any money back.Even if you take possession of the unit and accept keys - as long as you don't rent it to someone else, you can collect rent to the end of the lease.Page 27:http://www.georgialegalaid.org/files/6FCBD72D-B465...That's from Georgia Legal Aid, too, LOL.  

They were band-aided before I bought them.  

I may ruffle a few feather with this blunt statement but get rid of them.Getting them out now is cheaper than spending $5,000 on legal aid and attorney fees six months from now when their water goes wrongs again.

The answer from a tenant aid group is correct - the tenants can get this info readily.http://www.palawhelp.org/resource/security-deposit...

I didn't have late payments after that, except very rarely, and usually it would be a couple times a year with students waiting on their next financial aid payment.So, if you get rid of deadbeats, and go ahead and send some type of reminder, it will really cut down the late payments, in my experience.I really resisted reminding people to pay their rent at first, thinking I shouldn't have to be their mommy. 

But as the other posters indicate it seems to be relatively rare that a landlord would get paid anything in these circumstances.The issue of prison interfering with his rental chances is an interesting one but I think easily handled by an enterprising tenant: they could just say that they were living with friends or family, hence the gap in their rental history.

Its not worth the risk to me, tenants that require eviction often have Legal Aid on speed dial.