Tenant Refusing to Acknowledge New Property Manager

[Johnathan Swayne]

The rental is in Tacoma, WA. We have had a problematic tenant for some time, but back in Nov. 2021 we switched from managing directly to have a property manager take over. Our property manager was formally introduced to each tenant, the tenants were made aware of the switch, the existing leases were given over to the property manager, and the tenants were all given info on how to pay via the payment portal, send repair requests, contact property manager, etc. One of our tenants has seemingly chosen to completely ignore the existence of the PM and still operates as though they are under the management of the owner who originally signed the lease (the lease was a month to month at the time the PM took over, and the tenant was given a request to sign a new lease with the PM, but ignored it completely). For example, instead of paying through the management portal or giving a check to the PM they, without notice or permission, went to bank of the owner and had the clerk deposit a check into one of the owner's bank accounts at random for rent. As long as it had the owner's name on it, the tenant could legally just deposit the rent into it without our knowledge. Also, the tenant has been messaging the owner directly and not the PM. Back in Nov 2021 when the new PM was brought on they also delivered a 60 day notice to raise rent, which the tenant has completely ignored and the amount she is depositing directly into the owners account is less than actual rent, but because the check is made out to the owner the tellers at the bank just accept it even though legally we don't have to accept partial rent. 


Is it legal for her to ignore new property management and do these things to circumvent paying the new rent amount/force us to accept partial rent? Isn't it harassment if she continues to contact the owner directly?

[Richard F.]

Aloha,

Your post is not clear...was written notice of address change for payment of rent given? "Formally introduced" and "made aware of the switch" are doubtfully lawful "notice". What does the original agreement state about "notice", if anything? Also, "Given a request to sign a new lease" is meaningless. It sounds like the tenant is probably following the letter and intent of the original rental agreement. If no written termination letter was sent via certified/return receipt requested, or posted on the door of their unit and properly documented with witness and/or photos, it could very well be they consider the original still in effect, and rightfully so (Depending on exact wording of that document and local law).

It is for this very reason that I have, on numerous prior posts, advised that the "old" Owner/PM be instructed to send an introductory letter to the tenants, informing of new management, which would be followed up by a more detailed letter from the "new" Owner/PM, along with new Owner/PM sending termination notice at the earliest lawful date to end the old agreement.

The unspoken question here is, why has it taken your "new" PM a year to get a handle on this; and is this PM duly licensed and qualified per local law?

[Nathan Gesner]

Quote from @Johnathan Swayne:

If your PM were worth the price, they would be leading the way in this situation instead of leaving you to ask this question from strangers on the internet.

The notice of new management should be in writing with a clear start date. If the tenant fails to adhere to that notice, then there should be a consequence. In my company, I would hand-deliver a notice warning the tenant that one more violation would result in a fine (currently $100 for communicating with the owner). If they did it again, I would terminate them for violating the lease.

Your PM doesn't know how to control the situation or lacks the intestinal fortitude.

[Eliott Elias]

Owner needs to block the tenants number, block incoming checks from tenant to the bank, and property manager needs to step in and be aggressive in making it known who tenant needs to report to. 

[Johnathan Swayne]

Quote from @Richard F.:
Aloha,

Your post is not clear...was written notice of address change for payment of rent given? "Formally introduced" and "made aware of the switch" are doubtfully lawful "notice". What does the original agreement state about "notice", if anything? Also, "Given a request to sign a new lease" is meaningless. It sounds like the tenant is probably following the letter and intent of the original rental agreement. If no written termination letter was sent via certified/return receipt requested, or posted on the door of their unit and properly documented with witness and/or photos, it could very well be they consider the original still in effect, and rightfully so (Depending on exact wording of that document and local law).

It is for this very reason that I have, on numerous prior posts, advised that the "old" Owner/PM be instructed to send an introductory letter to the tenants, informing of new management, which would be followed up by a more detailed letter from the "new" Owner/PM, along with new Owner/PM sending termination notice at the earliest lawful date to end the old agreement.

The unspoken question here is, why has it taken your "new" PM a year to get a handle on this; and is this PM duly licensed and qualified per local law?

 Well I was trying to be brief so as not to bog down the post, but to offer more clarity to the situation and some of the questions you posed here is more information. With regard to the switch, at the time that new PM took over we walked the property with him and introduced him in person to each tenant at which time they were all given a written notice from him that stated his official start date (Which at the time was Nov 1st, roughly 30-45 days out from the time they were handed the notice) and all the formal instructions for rent payment, tenant portal info, new contact info, business office address, etc. 

He took over in November 2021 and about mid-way through the month also gave the required 60 day rent increase notices to the tenants that starting in February (60+ days from time the notice was given) rent would be increased. The next month, which was December of 2021 this tenant stopped paying rent (It's important to note that at the time she was given a rent increase notice she had always paid rent on time and there was no indication she would not be paying rent) and said she had lost her job and was applying for rental assistance. It was impossible to evict both due to Washington laws and individual county laws. Even though she was on a month to month the county did away with no-cause termination of month to month and also put up huge barriers for non-payment of rent. The city was horrendously bogged down so the processes that the lawyers were going through were incredibly slow. During this time she applied for rental assistance from the city, which was also incredibly slow, but eventually they came through and paid her back rent and paid her future rent through September of 2022. During this time she was communicating with the property manager in a standard way and wasn't making any attempts to circumvent the PM and go directly to the owner, so this wasn't really an issue.

Because we accepted the financial assistance from the city there were stipulations that we could not make any attempt to evict this tenant for another 6 months from the time the rental assistance was accepted, which was in June, so basically no matter what we couldn't evict her until beginning of 2023. This is relevant because while the city paid her rent through September, once October came she didn't pay rent, then November she didn't pay rent, and December she didn't pay rent. BUT it turns out she was paying rent by going directly to the bank and depositing checks, but the owner has multiple checking accounts with this bank and the teller was just picking an account with his name on it and depositing the check so we literally did not know the money was going into an account for almost 3 and a half months until I checked one of our dormant accounts that we used for a separate purposed and saw that there were check deposits being made. I called the bank and verified who had been making the deposit. This was literally a few days ago. 

The city acknowledged her rent increase and paid accordingly, but we think the reason she is doing this circumvention is because the PM payment portal has her rent at the higher rate and she is ignoring it and just paying what was on her original lease. The reason why it's taken a year is because up until this time she was communicating with the PM like normal but not in a position where she was having to pay rent for almost a year, and now that she was to pay rent she's circumventing the PM and trying to contact the owner directly for property related issues. We have refused to respond to her and have had the PM step in and make it very clear who she is supposed to interact with and how she is supposed to make payments. 


I guess my overall theme in the question is that just because she didn't sign a new lease explicitly under the new PM, doesn't mean she should be allowed to ignore the fact that he took over in that position, correct? Him being brought on as PM and having the leases handed over to him doesn't mean that she either has to sign a new lease with him or can completely ignore him as PM? This happens all the time where a new PM company takes over at a property and the existing lease is basically just absorbed by the new PM, right? 

[Johnathan Swayne]

Quote from @Nathan Gesner:

Quote from @Johnathan Swayne:

If your PM were worth the price, they would be leading the way in this situation instead of leaving you to ask this question from strangers on the internet.

The notice of new management should be in writing with a clear start date. If the tenant fails to adhere to that notice, then there should be a consequence. In my company, I would hand-deliver a notice warning the tenant that one more violation would result in a fine (currently $100 for communicating with the owner). If they did it again, I would terminate them for violating the lease.

Your PM doesn't know how to control the situation or lacks the intestinal fortitude.

 You can read my response to Richard for more details, but I guess my specific question is that a tenant does not have a legal defense for ignoring new management just because a new lease was not signed, correct? A management company can come in and assume management while absorbing the existing leases and the tenants are now beholden to that PM company even if the lease was signed originally with a private owner? 

[Richard F.]

Quote from @Johnathan Swayne:

I guess my overall theme in the question is that just because she didn't sign a new lease explicitly under the new PM, doesn't mean she should be allowed to ignore the fact that he took over in that position, correct? Him being brought on as PM and having the leases handed over to him doesn't mean that she either has to sign a new lease with him or can completely ignore him as PM? This happens all the time where a new PM company takes over at a property and the existing lease is basically just absorbed by the new PM, right? 

It sounds like the new PM gave them written notice, which, given the fact you state you were with the tenant and PM at the same time should not be an issue. However, depending on the written terms of that original lease, if the notice was NOT given as specified in it, it could be an issue...technically. It does also depend on the actual term of that original lease and the stated renewal terms of it. Any valid lease stays in force for the tenant, regardless of change in ownership of the property, or change in management for the property. If it says it automatically renews monthly or yearly, that does not change, and does not require signatures from either side. You have to follow all of the terms of the original lease until it is superseded in writing by all parties. It IS generally customary and acceptable, with proper written notice, to change where a payment is to be sent, and update
management contact info, but in order to change "material" terms such as method of payment, or amount of late fee, or virtually anything else specified in the original, you need to bilaterally agree to, and sign, a new agreement. To eliminate potential conflict, you should first properly terminate the original.

Given that you have received subsidy funds for much of the tenancy and had to wait on an eviction moratorium to file, I would just file an eviction as soon as the moratorium is lifted and get them out. They are clearly playing games with you now. Close the accounts they were depositing to and give written instructions to the bank not to accept any similar payments from tenants or your court case will fail.

[Theresa Harris]

Is the old owner you or another person in which case you've not been getting any rent?  IF the current owner has not been getting rent either indirectly from the PM or directly from the tenant, then post notice of failure to pay rent and start the eviction process.

Could it also be, she doesn't want to use the rental portal?  I give my tenants a few different ways to pay.  Some do etransfers and others give me a set of postdated cheques.

[Nathan Gesner]

Quote from @Johnathan Swayne:

 You can read my response to Richard for more details, but I guess my specific question is that a tenant does not have a legal defense for ignoring new management just because a new lease was not signed, correct? A management company can come in and assume management while absorbing the existing leases and the tenants are now beholden to that PM company even if the lease was signed originally with a private owner? 

That is correct. All existing contracts transfer with the sale of the property.  The Lease Agreement is between the Tenant and the new Owner and he has no legal reason for ignoring that. I can't even understand why he wants to try.

[Rick Bassett]

We've had similar things happen when we've taken over properties on more than one occasion. As long as the owner doesn't enable the tenant behavior by responding to or taking their calls, we can get those tenants 'trained' pretty quickly; when the owner keeps themselves in the tenant loop, it's tough to break that tenant behavior. I tell the owners that in these situations, the tenants are like the children of divorced parents just playing us off of each other trying to get the best situation for themselves, and all that does is to cost the owner money if they allow it to happen. When the owner finally gets out of the way it's easier to rein the tenant in or to plan for their departure with a nonrenewal. 

[Drew Sygit]

Some tenants do this and they need to be evicted

[Brian Hughes]

I'm pretty hands on with my properties insofar as maintenance and upgrades so I am frequently in contact with my tenants and they all know who I am,  but I leave routine stuff  (rent collection,   leasing / showing / movein / moveout, basic turnovers,  notices, etc)  to property management.   This does mean I come in contact with tenants pretty often.    I've definitely run into situations where the tenant tries to play both sides and confuse things claiming I said or agreed to something when talking with the PM or vice versa.    I also have a couple 'legacy' tenants who were in place before I hired PM that still periodically contact me directly for things.    

My response when a tenant calls me these days (infrequent,  but still sometimes occurs) is almost always a polite  "please contact the PM -  I've hired them to be your 24/7 first point of contact if you need anything.  I'll get involved if I need to;   thanks"

In the case of the tenant that was trying to play me against the PM they were not a legacy tenant but inherited with a new property acquisition.   They had my personal contact because shortly after I purchased the building they had a fire in their unit,   and to try and expedite repairs as much as possible I was communicating with them directly for a while.   They of course kept the info and eventually the relationship went downhill as I had to enforce some lease terms around some of their behavior which they pushed back against.  They started making "legal" threats and personal attacks once I got to the point of making moves other than polite requests that they could not just ignore to force the issue.  Long story short I ended up telling them very clearly I was blocking their number and email/SMS and I would only communicate with them formally via the property mananger.   If they asked me anything in person of importance when I was onsite I would decline to answer and send them a formal written response via the PM.   I've also been reporting any conversations I have with them in person back to the PM.   Once I took those steps it mostly stabilized the situation though that tenant is still a bit 'dramatic' at times.  (I should note for all the drama this tenant is current on rent - otherwise they would not have received the level of patience they got)

[Drew Sygit]

You could also block the tenant number, forcing them to call the new PMC