Evicting a tenant is not a glamorous part of real estate investing for the tenant or the landlord. In General, if rent has not been received from a tenant by the 8th or 9th of the month, call the renter. Leases stipulate that the tenant has a grace period until the 5th of the month to mail rent without being charged any type of late fee. As long as the envelope is postmarked by the 5th - no late fee. Allowing 3 or 4 days (from the 5th) for a renter's payment to arrive is pretty loose and plenty of time to allow for the rent to be received from cross-town mail.

If upon a call to the renter you think that there will be problems, immediately deliver a 3-day notice to the property. A copy of the notice is made before delivering. The 3-day notice is put up on the front door of the property if the renter or other occupant is not there when it's delivered. Any tenant that reaches this point (the starting of the eviction process), is advised that the 3-day notice is simply being posted as a way to protect interests in the event the tenant doesn't make good on the outstanding monies due.

Attaching a 3-day notice to the renter's door does not negatively affect the tenant's public record. It's not until the 3-day is formally filed that it becomes public record. The landlord cannot file for eviction until 3 business days have passed from the point the 3 day-notice was placed on the property. Once the 3 business days are up, the landlord can start the formal eviction process. How does this start? You will take your paperwork, including a copy of the 3-day notice, and file to have an eviction hearing. Use an attorney to process all of the evictions. Specifically, one specializing in handling evictions. I personally recommend using an lawyer that will try to remedy the situation with the renter before the case is even heard. You don't have to use an lawyer - you can do alot of this yourself and save a few bucks, but I recommend you use one. If you've never been to your local court system to witness eviction hearings, I highly recommend it. You'll quickly get a feel of what takes place during these hearings and will know what to expect ahead of time should you ever get to the point of serving an eviction on one of your own properties.

You can expect it take approximately two weeks before your hearing is scheduled. It's important to note that I always keep the communication line open with the tenant through this whole process. I think this is extremely important. I want the renter to know that I don't like going down this path just as much as the renter doesn't. It's not my goal just to boot a renter out of the property. In fact, I try very hard to work out payment arrangements or even payment assistance resources with the tenant in an effort to get him or her back up on their feet. Yes it may take a little hand-holding and some of your extra time, but I'd say eight out of ten tenants going through this extra hand-holding will appreciate your trying to help and will ultimately clear their overdue balances with you. You walk a very fine line here with the tenant in that he or she may also be taking advantage of you. It can be a tough call. At times it can simply come down to relying on your gut feeling with the situation.

Page 1 of 2 :: First | Last :: Prev | 1 2 | Next