Tenant refuses to transfer electricity - Landlord Forum thread 356468

Tenant refuses to transfer electricity by Joe (MI) on March 17, 2018 @11:32

Upon signing the lease, tenant promised that she would transfer electricity service to her name. After she moved in, she failed to do that. For several months, I repeatedly told her to transfer electricity, but she always said working on it and never did. She paid electricity bills to me. Last month, she said that she owed electricity company lots of money so she could not do the transfer. She wanted to use electricity under my name by paying the bills. One week ago, she even started refusing to pay electricity bills. Since the lease says that providing utilities is her responsibility and I was only doing her a favor by not turning off, do I have the legal right to call DTE to stop service because she will not pay the bills? Will doing that make the house unlivable and thus get me sued? Please advise. Thanks.

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Re: Tenant refuses to transfer electricity by Clem on March 17, 2018 @11:39	[ Reply ]

Send her a notice that she is in violation of the lease. Follow up with a notice to termination the lease. If she will not follow the lease then do an eviction. This process should have been started from the start beginning. If you shut off the electric you will be sued and you will loose in court.

Re: Tenant refuses to transfer electricity

Re: Tenant refuses to transfer electricity by Anonymous on March 17, 2018 @13:33	[ Reply ]

We tell our tenants that they must have a verifiable confirmation number from the utility company BEFORE we will move forward with the lease and give them access to the unit. If they don't provide us with the information, they don't get the keys.

Re: Tenant refuses to transfer electricity