More kids then originally told

[David P.]

Hello everyone,

i consider myself a careful and seasoned landlord. Most recently I had a unit for rent and I screened  carefully, made them do my smart move application, checked paystubs, bank statements. My smart move application gave them a 758 score.  Went to visit there convience store that they own locally that's been around since 07. Everything checked out fine. Even called prior landlords who say they been fine on rent. Upon the first few visit I only saw 3 kids and confirmed with the wife it was only 3. After moving in I find out there are 6 kids. 4 are high school and above and 2 are around 10 yrs old. It is a 3 bd/2.5 bath 2300 sqft home so fairly large but I already feel lied to. They are paying 4k/month in LA so it's a decent amount. With the current rental climate and evictions, landlords have very little ammo to work with. Would you guys shrug it off and just hope they pay rent in future or would you guys bring it up and stir the pot? I feel like best to leave it be and just hope that's the worst of it and they are still quality tenants. I think they purposely lied because most landlords would be turned off by that big of a family. Any thoughts?

[Karl B.]

If they're paying all the utilities and you're happy with the rent amount I would let it go (mainly because it's California which is tenant-friendly). 

I know some cities/states have a formula on how many people can live in a unit (it's usually based on the number of bedrooms) but aside from using a maximum occupancy argument a legal battle in L.A. would be a headache, no doubt.