Trespassing on Vacant Rental

[Rebecca Graziano]

Hello,

I have a vacant rental property (2 months) that needs some work before market-ready again. However, there has been multiple break ins through the doors and a rear window, water is being turned on as well.

My new PM said they saw a neighbor jump the fence from our property, and then come over and talk to them? It appears they were stealing our water from the backyard with a hose.

My PM says they don't want to manage our property long-term. It's not a high-crime area, there's no drug actives or violent crime, but since it is vacant and no one has kept an eye, and the utilities are on, anything can happen. We told them to file the police report, add motion sensor lights, and no trespassing signs.

What else should I do? How do I contain this from getting worse?

Thank you,

[Matt P.]

@Rebecca Jackson That's tough, I'm sure you'll get a lot of good ideas soon. In my experience adding the motion sensor or even dusk to dawn lights helps keep the riff raff away so I think your doing the right thing there. Best way to prevent this is get it rented so you definitely want to focus your resources on figuring out the quickest way to make that happen. Good luck.