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month to month tenant situation - Landlord Forum thread 359755

month to month tenant situation by fredsmith on September 27, 2019 @22:23

                              
Hello everyone, I have a rental property occupied by a tenant and child. We started
with a one year lease and have been month to month for about a year after that.
Last month, the tenant demanded that $200 be deducted from the rent(to compensate
for thawed food) because the freezer wasn't working properly. When I went to check
on the fridge on the same day, I saw it is operating fine after a quick inspection.
When I went there, I noticed that the renter's significant other with another child
moved in without notifying me. Public records show that the new adult is already
using my property as their mailing address.



If the repair guy finds nothing wrong with the fridge can I deduct $200 from the
tenant's security deposit? Tenant has been on time with monthly payments. What are
my options right now? Can I evict them or should I raise their rent and start a new
lease?

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Re: month to month tenant situation by Garry on September 29, 2019 @12:57 [ Reply ]
NO, you cannot deduct $200 from the T's deposit. The Sec. Deposit cannot be touched until after the T has moved out. You did not say if the T did actually deduct $200 from the rent, and that you accepted the lower amount of rent. If you did accept the lower amount, then you will just have to eat the $200.

Now, about the extra unauthorized tenant. If your original T has been paying on time, not causing any problems, and keeping your rental in decent shape, just raise the rent by 5%. There is no need to evict someone, as long as they are not causing you problems.

But FIRST, personally go to visit your T, and have the "guest" fill out an application form for you. Then run it, and if everything looks good to your liking, THEN send a letter to both of them, saying you are going to raise the rent by xxx amount on Dec.1, and they both need to sign a new lease with you. Make sure you sign just a M2M lease with them, so you can give them a 30 day notice to move if something in the future doesn't work out. However, if the new "guest" does not check out too well to your liking, then you may want to consider giving your original T a 30 day notice to move.
Re: month to month tenant situation by hector on October 2, 2019 @03:07 [ Reply ]
If the tenants are regularly paying the rent, don't make a hurry to evict them. Evicting a tenant will cause a jumble of tenant turnover.
Rather, discuss all these problems with the tenant in-person and warn about their behavior. For the new occupant, issue a move-out notice. If they are consistently misbehaving, raise their rent by a few percent.

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