Real Estate Investor Articles

If you are in the rental business, sooner or later, you are going to have a tenant who inexplicably stops paying rent. They may give you the run around with stories about why they can't pay and promises of a full payment plus late fees just around the corner. Or, they may simply ignore your phone calls and refuse to answer the door if you show up in person to try to collect rent. Bottom line is, when it comes to this point, these tenants will need to be served with a three day notice to vacate to initiate the eviction process.

While you may be frustrated and tempted to take measures into your own hands, it is very important to follow the legal procedure for removing a non-paying tenant from your property. Specifically, the law expressly forbids you from doing the following:

Removing or Changing Locks

In no way is it legal for you to remove the locks, or put new locks on the property to “lock out” your tenant. It doesn't matter if they are months behind on their rent, have totally trashed the house and are in violation of every provision in the lease. They are legally protected against a “lock out” and can take you to court to regain entry.

Furthermore, cute tricks like removing the front door are also clearly illegal.

Follow up:

Utility Shut-offs

You may not shut off the water, gas or electricity in an attempt to force your tenants to move out. Again, your tenants, however far behind in rent they are, can seek legal recourse against you for this action and can collect hefty fines against you.

Taking Tenant's Property

You may not harass your tenant into moving out. This would include illegally entering the rental unit and taking their property. Only under very specific circumstances (abandonment) is a landlord allowed to remove a tenant's property.

Physical Removal

Only the legal authority (usually the sheriff's office or their agents) can remove a tenant after a writ of possession is obtained from the court and the legal waiting time has elapsed. This means that you can't hire your own help to physically move out a tenant.

While the above list describes the major things that you, as a landlord, cannot do to get a tenant to move out, it is not all inclusive. Any number of other creative strategies to harass or compel a tenant to move out are also illegal.

The only legal way to remove a tenant from your property is to go through the legal eviction process. Yes, it costs money and yes it takes time. Remember that you can deduct the unpaid rent for the period that your tenant remains in the property during the eviction process from their security deposit.

The best thing that you can do to minimize your losses is to be firm with the rental due date and promptly post 3 day notices when your tenants have not delivered rent on time. This will ensure the fastest possible repossession of your property should you need to file for an eviction.

Until my next post,

James