Tenants Owe Over 10K in Rent and wont pay!
Los Angeles, CA · Member since 2008 · 16 posts · 0 votes
As the title says, my tenants went 3 months without paying their rent. They have since been evicted, but it has been close to 8 months since the eviction with no money in sight.
What are my options? What would you do in this situation? Is there a way to get my money without having to deal with courts and lawyers? Possibly a lien?
What should I do?
I moved this over to the rental property forum.
The truth is you're unlikely to see any money even with lawyers and courts. You're pretty much guaranteed to see none of the money without a judgment. You need to go to court and get a judgment. Depending on the amount, you might be able to do this in small claims court. Then, have that judgment recorded against the people involved and reported to the credit agencies. Maybe someday something will happen in their lives that makes them want to deal with this judgment. And, out of the blue, you'll get a call and some money. But until that day, its a bad debt you're unlikely to collect. Move on.
Jon
I'd have to agree with Wheatie here. You will never get your money from them without taking them to court and getting a judgment and even then, they'll only consider paying if they care about their credit rating.
I had someone who owed me much more than that (not a tenant) and I decided to hire a lawyer to get a judgment against them. After a few thousand more on legal fees, I got my judgment but have not collected anything to date. I'm in the midst of hiring a collection agency to go after my money at a 50/50 split as I don't have the time or capability to find out where he is, what assets he has, or how to legally lay claim to what I find. He had no credit rating to begin with so he doesn't fear the black mark and my guess is that I'll be lucky if I ever see anything back.
The one thing you do have going for you is that it seems that this ex-tenant of yours must make some good money if they built up that much debt in only 3 months so they may be more able to pay their debt than my deadbeat. If you get a judgment, you can legally garnish their wages (if they're employed) or take other property they own such as vehicles in order to satisfy the judgment.
Good luck!
This is not a sales pitch, but I belong to group that specializes in Judgment recovery. I don't do this but this group is very good at tracking assets and employment. Judgments are collected on a percentage basis.
If you want more info let me know.
Lefty
The truth is that it is nearly impossible to make a deadbeat pay a judgement. At one point, I had more than $500,000 in unpaid debts in another business. We hired a very aggressive collection agency. They did everything possible including suing several of the accounts and getting judgements. However, when a person is deeply in debt, with no significant assets, you simply are NOT going to collect unless they straighten their lives out sometime in the future.
Good luck,
Mike
If you want more info let me know.
Lefty
LONG STORY SHORT:
A bad tenant owes and causes damages/loss to the tune of over $5000 and fled in the middle of the night. How can they be tracked down so they can be sued and held responsible?
LONG STORY:
I helped an owner source tenants for 2 of his units in the same property. I think he was satisfied with my services and at that time wanted me to play an active part in evicting a whiny "never satisfied" tenant. All I knew about this family was 2nd-hand information: from the owner and from 2 different maintenance people who have been involved in the past.
I gave the owner tips of what to do and agreed to accompany him as a photo taker. I met the owner who came with his wife at the property. This "tough" tenant started boo-hooing, begging and promising to do better. Husband and wife (common law) started blaming each other for their past bad behavior. I didn't care one bit, but her daughters soon joined the "crying game" - moping and pleading with puppy-dog eyes that they wanted to remain in their school.
I took the owner aside and asked him what kinds of problems he'd been having. He explained that it was mostly behavioral attitude: cussing him, bugging and irritating him with the silliest demands for repairs, holding rent ransom for up to two weeks for no good reason... To me, nothing major, just minor irritation and negative attention gathering.
As a compromise, I volunteered to intervene as the middleman. The tenants will call and deal with me and I will collect his rent from them on behalf of the landlord. We will try this month-to-month for 6 months. The owner reluctantly agreed. His wife was adamant that the tenants move right away but finally agreed after I established a strict set of rules for the tenants. I told the long story for a reason.
In the 8th month of this arrangement the owners (couple) were away from the country for 6 weeks and obviously the tenants knew this. I had no legal documentation on this rental situation. The lady tenant played all sorts of games to avoid paying rent. Bottomline, they fled "in the middle of the night" with 2 months rent unpaid. But the kicker is that they trashed the apartment, broke into the man's basement storage where he stored a lot of medical equipment, and left the door unlocked and open. The loss is high. His wife wants them to be held accountable and so do I.
~miffed! :badwords:
Whoa! Back up the horse! You said that you established strict rules. If that's the case, how did they get 2 months behind on rent? Weren't you insisting that the rent be paid on time each month?
The bottom line is that tenants MUST be held accountable for the lease if you want to be successful in this business. The day after the rent is late you should start the eviction procedure. Coming to an agreement with a tenant is pointless and silly. You already have an agreement with the tenant when the lease is signed. If they aren't going to honor their lease agreement, they certainly are not going to honor their secondary agreement. This is a self-inflicted wound!
Mike
Thanks for your helpful reply, Mike. I still need to know, if you can help, how to track the tenants down.
Clarifications:
1) I NEVER signed anything with the tenant. I know, it's a huge fumble but one that I undertook as a gamble and I lost.
2) I requested the original lease from the owner, at least twice and he either couldn't or didn't want to supply them. He kept promising to do so and I really didn't hound him as I arrogantly thought this tenant was actually reformed and grateful. I couldn't even guarantee the correct spelling of the tenant's name, let alone other legal information.
3) I mentioned that the tenant must have been aware that the owner was out of the country because she used to call me a few days to the end of the month to come and get the rent but this time I called her on the 2nd and she humbly asked mt to wait till Friday (another 3 days). She promptly called me Friday to come and get the rent. When I went, I was told by her family she was out. I had my first bad feeling. I called her phone and reminded her that I staked my professional credibility to vouch for her loyalty and she was jeopardizing it.
The next day, she called to apologise and to know if I was coming to get the rent (hoping I couldn't), and I bluffed and said I could be there in 20 minutes, then she changed and said she was at a family gathering. I was upset and I threatened her with eviction but I think she knew that I couldn't legally. She was just a manipulative malcontent who needed to keep drama in her life.
4) She played this game for the entire 6 weeks - alternating between "remorse" and indifference. I didn't have the legal locus standii to file any eviction suit against her and . The last time she called me was days before the owner was to return, and she told me her tax return was en route and she apologised again and thanked me for being patient and understanding.
My beef is both with her and the owner. The owner didn't provide me with adequate tools to do my job of covering him effectively and for that he paid. The tenant was just a self-centered, vindictive, trouble-loving user.
After all that, I'd like to find a way to direct a lawsuit to her (new address) and then turn the decision of actually acting on it over to the owner. I appreciate any/all feedback. I hope Lefty is still reading.
It seems to me you have only 2 options.
1. Hire a PI to track them down, hire a lawyer to sue them, this will be expensive and the deadbeats that they are you most likely won't see a dime of the money.
2. Figure out the damages, enter a judgment against them, have a recovery specialist go after them. Please not that the JRS work on a percentage basis and it will take a while to find them. When they are found then the game begins, do they work, have a car, a boat, a rental deposit, etc. anything to get some money out of them.
As everyone has suggested a judgment is the only way to go. It depends on what state the judgment is in it can be renewed and go on for quite awhile.
Lefty