Tenant broke lease day 1 - CA property - Landlord Forum thread 360938

Tenant broke lease day 1 - CA property by Creative148 on November 15, 2020 @11:28

Hi all, I am a private owner/landlord and have a situation that has never came up for me before and need your expert advice. I advertised my condo for rent early Oct. A tenant from out of the area loved it from pictures and had her mother view the unit for her prior to application. She swore she loved it and that not seeing it in person herself was fine... her mother was a great judge. Long story short, she signed a lease early Oct for Nov. move in. Well, when she went to move in and finally saw the unit for herself, she decided it would never work for her and did not take keys and said she was sorry, but she cannot move in (all very minor cosmetic issues I offered to fix) I do have one month security deposit from her, but she has not paid anything else. I am trying to re-rent ASAP, but as people tend to look well in advance, I am finding there will be likely be a larger gap of time in between than one month that the security deposit would cover. Am I not legally allowed to collect the difference in rent from her for the time gap? She did sign a one year lease. Please advise. THANK YOU!

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Re: Tenant broke lease day 1 - CA property by Garry on November 15, 2020 @12:53	[ Reply ]

First point-------NEVER show a place, unless it is 100% ready to be moved into. The "minor cosmetic issues" you "offered to fix", should already have been fixed before you showed it. Next, You have a signed lease and a deposit. Did you get a signed paper from the T saying she does not want it, and you can rerent it to someone else. If you don't have that paper, in theory, she can still move in at a later date, if she pays you the Nov. rent. If you didn't get her to sign that letter giving up the condo, you must now give her the standard 3 day notice to pay rent, or quit. That way, she either pays you rent for Nov. OR she chooses to "quit", meaning she chooses not to move in. At that point, you still have her deposit. Now you can try to rerent the place. Any lost rent that you should have gotten from the original lease with her, can be taken out of that deposit. Also you can deduct any advertising costs, and any utilities you paid from Nov. 1, on, til it's rented. Yes, she will owe you rent until you get it rented again. That's what the deposit is for. BUT----to collect any more from her, you would need to go to court next year to try to get it. My suggestion is ; rerent asap, use her deposit up in provable costs, forget about going to court, take your lumps (losses) and go on with your life.

Re: Tenant broke lease day 1 - CA property by Robert on November 17, 2020 @10:02	[ Reply ]

Look at the bright side. You got rid of a tenant that would have probably been a ongoing problem. At least you kept the deposit. Legally allowed and odds of collecting are 2 totally different things.

Re: Tenant broke lease day 1 - CA property by Brendan on December 22, 2020 @22:15	[ Reply ]

With the out of towner, shouldn't you have collected some deposit money non-refundable to mitigate a negative situation like that.