All Forum Posts by: Bruce Chang

@Louis W. - If the property is under rent control and rents are very low, you may have a difficult time finding a property manager as their fees are based off of  a percentage of the rental amount.  Right now you need to address any habitability issues, because that is what they can sue you for if that is their angle.

@Louis W.

In rent controlled San Francisco, lease agreements do not expire. There is no month to month or year to year lease.  If you still have a copy of the old lease agreement, that is the one you and your tenants are legally bound to.  It sounds like a very complicated situation.  Are the original tenants listed on the lease still occupying the property?

I'm in tenant friendly California if that makes any difference.

For a rent control unit, adding their name to the lease would be a huge mistake especially if the rent is extremely below market.  Take a look at NYC, I understand their are businesses built around trying to catch tenants illegally subletting so they could evict them out of their rent control apartments.

To all you experienced landlords, short of installing cameras, how do you guys catch illegal subletting?  For instance, we've seen some unfamiliar faces in the past on our property, and they always claim that they are a friend of a tenant and just staying for a few days.  We're in a rent controlled city, and it's extremely difficult to evict tenants for subletting unless you have absolute 100% proof.

Yes, the gate is a common entry area to a set of stairs which leads to the two units. I'm inclined to not fix the gate as it's been broken so many times.  Also, I just checked and our local rent control board does not allow us to charge the tenant for repairs unless we can prove the lock was broken by the tenant.  Since neither tenant will fess up to breaking it, I'm not sure if it's worth it to fix it again.  Local ordinance says that we are required to have deadbolts on the front door(which we do), but doesn't say anything about security gates.  Thoughts?

Have no idea why it keeps breaking.  Should we even bother fixing it?  Are we legally required to fix the security gate as the locks to the front doors of both units are working fine?

Who pays for the lock if tenants continue to keep breaking the lock?  Our family has a duplex, and the lock on the security gate has been fixed and broken several times.  Tenants point fingers at each other and neither take responsibility for breaking the lock.   Can we have the tenants split the cost of any future repairs or do we even bother fixing the security gate at all?  Front doors of both units have working dead bolts.  There is nothing in the lease that says the tenant needs to pay for a broken lock.

We are in a rent controlled city so I'm sure that changes things a bit.  

We have a tenant that was given a verbal agreement from the previous landlord that a dog was permissible on the premises only until it passed away.  Tenant claimed they were depressed without the dog even though there was no evidence it was a comfort/emotional support animal. We are changing the carpets in the home and come to find out, the dog has probably peed all over the carpet in the past causing the pad underneath to disintegrate.  The carpet is very old so we are not planning on suing to recapture any of the costs, but we have a few questions:

1.  The original lease states that no pets are allowed.  Is the verbal agreement still valid?  Can we now reinstate a no pets policy and enforce the original lease?

2.  Can we ask for a pet deposit?  Old landlord only had a $500 deposit which is nothing compared to how much a uncontrolled dog can damage the property.