Va hospital involved - Landlord Forum thread

Va hospital involved by denise (pa) on November 16, 2009 @17:17

i just recently (1 mo. ago) rented to a new tenant who is in a wheelchair. the VA supports all of his needs and the VA wants to tear out my bathtub and install a handicap shower. This may not seem like such an issue but once he moves out, i have totential renters who want a tub again, and besides all that, he is refusing to pay some other obligations that were made on the day of the lease signing and as of this day , his rent goes unpaid,im seeing my attorney in 2 days to see what MY rights are,can anyone guess what my att. might advise me to do?
his attorney contacted me today and is trying to threaten me, that i HAVE to allow them to make changes in the apt.

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Re: Va hospital involved by OK-LL on November 16, 2009 @17:21

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Your attorney is going to advise you to evict for non-payment of rent -- a process you should have started the day after it was due!

They now make handicapped tubs which have a door in the tub wall that opens almost level with the floor -- it would be an asset for a rental and very expensive to install. If that's what VA is talking about, I'd let them do it. If they want to trade the bath for a shower-only, I'd tell them no -- let them install a separate shower and if it doesn't fit in the bathroom, the house is not a proper place for their client.

Re: Va hospital involved

Re: Va hospital involved by Anonymous on November 16, 2009 @17:50

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Evicting him for non-payment this early is legal. You may have to legally let them change the tub to a shower (at their cost), but they would have to change it back when he moves out (at their cost) because your lease should have a clause in it that it be returned in the condition that it was rented in. I'm also wondering if he is on disability, this is going to make it hard to collect due rent (and other obligations you are talking about) that's he's not paying hard because you can't garnish disability.

Re: Va hospital involved

Re: Va hospital involved by Anonymous on November 16, 2009 @18:23	[ Reply ]
Good luck with getting the law to push this guy out to the curb. This is what you get when you rent to the handicapped.

Re: Va hospital involved by OK-LL on November 16, 2009 @19:16

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Here's the procedures you must follow to evict for non-payment of rent -- and yes, if you had served him 8 weeks ago when he didn't pay rent, you'd have him out by now.

http://www.tenant.net/Other_Areas/Penn/harris/pa-part5.html

The only defense I can see to the non-payment eviction is that the property is not habitable based on his disability, but that's a long shot. If the VA wanted to make alterations on tenant's behalf, that should have been a part of your original agreement and completed prior to move-in.

Re: Va hospital involved by xxx on November 17, 2009 @12:13	[ Reply ]
plus, he will have a lot of time on his hands to think about ways you have wronged him, and ways he can profit from this