I forgot to change the status of my home with the municipality before renting it, What Challenges Am I Looking At For Resolving This?

[Thomas Weaver]

Hi,

My wife and I moved out of the country for a year and decided to rent our house. My renter has been late every month but she has paid, that is up until last month. She has not paid last month and is 10 days late for this month. Upon looking up information on the eviction process, I realized that I did not change the status of my house to non-homestead and I neglected to inform our insurance company. These are things I just didn't even think of. Now I am afraid that by proceeding with an eviction process I would be incurring liabilities on myself for my mistake. What challenges should I expect in clearing this mistake up and returning things back to normal?

Thanks,
Thomas

[Steve Babiak]

The insurance is just a matter of contacting the insurance company or agent and telling them you have changed to a rental.

The homestead part will probably result in your getting a larger property tax bill.

The real issues will be if the municipality requires some kind of license to operate a rental, and whether they require some kind of inspection for suitability. There are places where you cannot file an eviction without first having been in good standing as a landlord with the municipality. I can't speak for your location ...