Do your tenants ever show up at your own house?

Question

There is a guy staying in one of my places.  1 or 2 times a month he randomly comes by my place to drink some beer/whiskey and have conversation.  If I have some maintenance work to do at a rental, I'll tell him about it and he does it over the weekend. Do any of your renters show up at your own house?

Sarah Brown · Answer

Nope.  None of my tenants know where I live.  If they can't pay their rent online, then they pay it to a PO Box.  If we need to meet, it's at the property.  I would never allow them to know where I live.  I also would never hire one to be my handyman, even if they are qualified.

Anthony Wick · Answer

I never co-mingle business and pleasure. I would not hire a tenant to work on one of my properties. I certainly wouldn't have drinks at my house with a current tenant.

John Underwood · Answer

I live an hour away, so no never.

Not even my long term rentals.

I don't accept friend requests from long term tenants either.

Ned J. · Answer

Nope..... that's stepping over the line into "friend" territory......and don't mix friends and business. I also don't hire tenants to do work on the property unless they are really good and I've worked with them before on another property first. Its pretty much a guarantee that when an issue comes up....late rent etc..... the first thing they will bring up is the "remember when I fixed that fence for you cheap?.....or replaced that light for you?" and they expect you to cut them a break...

Jesse Mancuso · Answer

I agree with the sentiment above, while you can always be 'friendly' and have a good working relationship with tenants it is a fine line that you should not cross. Use your best judgement but always remember this is a business transaction. Even though that may seem cold it may also save you a lot of headaches in the future.

Anthony Wick · Answer

@Will Gaston. Like most people, our number 1 business policy is; "No friends or family in our rentals". Ever. Period. Not a situation in the world where we change that. If a friend or family needs help, we will help them via some other method.

Anthony Wick · Answer

@John Underwood. A recent tenant did friend request me. He seems like a great guy. Professional. I'd definitely have a beer with the dude.....if he wasn't my tenant. I hope he didn't feel bad when I did not accept said friend request. It's just that, we aren't friends. Maybe after he moves out.

Will Gaston · Answer

@Paul Sandhu to each his own but I would imagine 9 out of 10 landlords that have done some version of this have ended up regretting it. Spoiler alert: I'm 1 of the 9.

My very first tenants were friends of mine before they rented from me. It was a terrible experience.

Never again.

Max T. · Answer

@Paul Sandhu has an interesting niche business model that sounds as if it works very well for him. It most likely will not work very well for us. I’m surprised Paul is asking the peanut gallery because I think he’s got it all figured out.

Erik Stenbakken · Answer

@Paul Sandhu I *have* hired tenants to do work for me (but generally not on their own house). I had a tile guy living in one place who did really good work. I hired him to do another property and had no regrets at all. I do have LTR tenants do light work for me sometimes but usually stuff in the yard. Nothing using power tools. Liability. Inside the house, I'd be concerned about them doing something half-assed that would be hard to undo if they did it wrong, so I don't do that.

Do your tenants ever show up at your own house?

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