Gotta Keep 'Em Unrelated

Yesterday afternoon, I filed the eviction for the downstairs tenants of property Chi. A property manager called me in the morning and asked about them, and I was honest about them paying rent on time every month. I couldn’t say anything bad about the rent until I was sure they wouldn’t pay. He didn't seem to care about the damages they would cause. Once I saw that only the upstairs tenants paid this month, I called him back to let him know that I just filed for eviction for the downstairs tenants. The upstairs tenants, Umar and Hanna, paid their rent so I don’t have to worry too much about them. In fact, it was my text conversation with Umar that led me to make an important decision.

I was laying in bed on Monday evening when the conversation began:

Umar: Hi, just to let you know we are still looking for place to live but didn’t find any yet

Me: Okay… will both apartments be paying rent this month? The downstairs tenants have already told me they will not pay.

Umar: I don’t know about them but I am planning to, so once again what will happen if we don’t find place to live by the end of this month?

Me: I’m unsure… we need to get the place renovated as soon as possible. If worse comes to worse, we may push the deadline to April 30th if you cannot find a place by the end of this month. If we do that, however, it means that we will not push it back any longer. Let’s see what happens this month though.

Me: And if the downstairs tenants don’t pay, they will be evicted immediately.

Umar: Ok, we both are looking so hard, it’s just some places required at least 2 months in advance

Me: Ok… continue to keep me posted

Umar: Oh sure and thank you for understanding

Me: Of course

(He asks questions about the renovations and then asked about the vacancy I had at property Charlie. I told him it was rented out.)

Umar: Ok. It’s just that I don’t have a problem with u and really want to live in a property that u manage

Me: I appreciate that Umar, and if anything comes up in the future I will definitely let you know.

After this conversation, I made the decision to no longer rent out an entire building with two or more apartments to one family. It just doesn’t work, as losing Umar is a casualty of this process that I really don’t like. If it were just Umar and Hanna, I would definitely keep them as tenants. But, because they’re related to the downstairs animals, I have no choice but to get rid of them to ensure that the animals don’t return to “visit” Umar and Hanna. The visit will be bullshit, and they’ll use the opportunity to cause trouble with new tenants. As much as I like Umar, I can’t take that risk.

Property Beta currently has both apartments rented out to Carver and his deceased girlfriend’s family, but there will be no more after that. On paper, having an entire family take over a multi-unit building should work. But there are too many things that can go wrong, especially in this case where one apartment sucks while the other is great. If they weren’t related, I would have simply thrown the downstairs tenants out and rent the place to new people, while keeping the upstairs tenants in place. Ugh. What a shame. Landlords would kill for a tenant like Umar, but I have to get him out. It’s a sad lesson learned, but a lesson learned nonetheless.

P.S.: The good news is that, if the downstairs tenants try to skip out before the court date, I can get the Pelcom guys to come in and get that place rental ready. I then have the rest of this month to get that place rented out! The bad news is I filed the eviction in the afternoon, which was a very bad move on my part. Had I filed in the morning (remembering that yesterday was the 6th), I would have gotten March 14th as my court date instead of the 17th. Because I filed it in the afternoon, they can’t really do anything until tomorrow which is Friday the 7th. If served on Friday, a court date can only be set for 7 days afterwards, which would be a Saturday. Since the courts are closed on Saturday (the 15th), I have to wait until Monday the 17th. An extra three days is an eternity when dealing with disgruntled tenants. Ugh! Another lesson learned.

P.P.S.: My next post should be my last. All the words are in my head, but organizing them into paragraphs and publishing them is a lot harder than I thought.