Why I won't take double security deposits for bad tenants
I read advertisements for other landlords' rental properties. Sometimes they say "if you have any evictions, it will be a double deposit". I wonder, why accept more money just to take on a bad tenant? I think those landlords think that the bad tenants won't wreck the place if they have to pay all that money up front.
Guess what -- IT DOESN'T ALWAYS WORK! Sometimes tenants don't care!
Here's a case study in that exact topic. This is not my building and not about my tenant. This was a tenant picked by a landlord who belongs to my local landlord group. He has a history of barely rehabbing his units and providing band-aid fixes when things break. I don't think he does the best screening, and he accepts double deposits if the tenant has had an eviction in the past.
This tenant (I'll call her "Jane Doe") had an eviction filed in October 2013 although it was dismissed. (In Milwaukee judges like what are called "stipulated dismissals" which means that the tenant can work out a payment arrangement with the landlord to pay the past rent, late fees, and attorney/filing fees to stay in the unit. They are often called "stay and pay agreements".) She had an actual eviction in December 2012 with a judgement of about $1,600. She had an actual eviction in October 2011 with a judgement of about $1,100. She had a judgement against her for over $10,000 in 2008 for negligent operation of a motor vehicle. She also had a judgement against her from the local power company in 2007 for $1,900.
So obviously, not the ideal tenant candidate but this landlord chose to rent to her anyway with a double deposit (rent was $650 so a deposit of $1,300 was collected) starting in March 2014.
Jane Doe brought bedbugs into the building so around July 2014 the owner had to pay $1,400 to eradicate the problem.
The tenant paid rent of $650 until September 2014 then in October 2014 only paid $600. Then in November 2014 only paid $575 and in December only paid $490.
Now you'd think that this landlord would have evicted her by now. Well, he didn't. What happened next is that apparently not only could the tenant not pay her rent, but she couldn't pay her electric either. So she got cut off. She had her boyfriend tap into the electric meter somehow and they caused $1,500 worth of damage that the owner had to pay for. So he took her entire $1,300 security deposit in December 2014 in order to pay for it.
So look at where we are at. The owner is out $200 for the electric tampering, and $285 for lost rent, and $1,400 for dealing with bedbugs. But he didn't evict her! (Maybe he thought things were going to get better?)
According to the owner, he "drove out" the other tenant so the lower tenant in this duplex left sometime in late 2014. (A "midnight move-out" as they call it.)
I got involved in dealing with this property in late January 2015. First of all, the tenant's friends were occupying the basement of this duplex and had set up a little "rec room" down there. However, it appeared that they were smoking down there and potentially using the lower unit's electricity. I solved that issue by having the contractor remove the outlets from the basement -- now, no one could plug anything down there and there was no reason for anyone to hang out in the basement.
I told Jane Doe she had to vacate by March 31, 2015 as we were going to "renovate the building" (which is true but I just wanted her GONE). She decided not to pay March's rent and stayed past the deadline and didn't pay any rent for April either. Finally, mid-April, this tenant moved out.
And now it comes to dealing with the after-math of what she left behind.
This is the basement area where her friends were hanging out:
They left not only piles of "stuff" behind, but there was evidence that they were using drugs down there. And, they must have thought that going upstairs or outside to urinate was "too inconvenient" for them, because 8 bottles of uncapped urine was found in the back storage room.
In the actual upper unit itself, the carpeting was pretty stained up and there was ground up food in it. Cheetos, cookies, candy bars, and even uneaten pizza was found on the floor.
There was a storage room in this unit, and at some point they must have had a dog of some kind (although I had never seen a dog there). The storage room appears to have been where the dog was kept during the day. There was a ripped up pillow or something else in the closet as there was tons of stuffing on the floor.
After clearing out the mess of stuffing and other junk on the floor, the contractor found "about 20" piles of old dog excrement.
The tenant must have had so much money by not paying rent, that she could afford to buy a bunch of food and leave it behind in the fridge.
That's a huge pack of chicken on the bottom shelf there. I think it was around 5 pounds or so. And here I thought that was it. Finally after clearing out the boxes and bags of trash in front of the balcony door, we opened the door and were greeted with an interesting surprise -- more rotting food and dirty diapers and all sorts of other trash.
Yes, that's another huge package of uncooked chicken on the porch.
The contractor spent about the whole day getting rid of all the stuff and double bagging the food due to the smell. I knew there had to be something up as when I walked into the unit after the tenant said she left, there were a swarm of fruit flies buzzing about.
Oh, and some interesting notes of my experience with Jane Doe:
a) When she hadn't moved out on April 1st, she asked me if I had any other units available. Even though I had, I said NO. C'mon, really, you didn't pay March rent, and you want to know if I have any other units available???
b) She moved out and NO other landlord ever called me for a reference about her. That means someone else just took her on, even though she has a pending eviction filed against her and all the previous transgressions.
Guess they just took a double security deposit ...