All Forum Posts by: Andrew S.

 Good for you!  Sounds like you dodged the bedbug bullet - now you can focus on the tenants...

 I assume there is a valid lease in place?  If so, you can't just "get rid of them" - being an idiot and trouble is not a lease violation.

You are doing the right thing by bringing in an expert to determine presence/absence of bedbugs.  Then you can decide on next steps.  Note that if you really do have bedbugs, you generally hold very weak cards in front of a judge.  You will have to bite the bullet and get rid of them, no matter what it takes (and it will VERY likely take a professional treatment).

Seems 3.5% is way too low for a commercial loan

@Derrick W.   It sounds like you are contemplating the purchase of this property and don't already own it?  In that case, work the numbers for removal into the deal and if it still makes sense, go ahead, if not, walk away.  Dead trees of that size on your rental property are unpredictable and very dangerous to the life and property of yourself, as well as your tenants and are a huge liability.  Do not just ignore it - they have to go!  It's part of doing business.  

If it's any consolation, our entire city is built into the middle of a forest, so ALL my properties have many, many trees.  You are absolutely correct.  They are beautiful, and sometimes they die, and when they die, they tend to get expensive (and, unfortunately,  I have invoices north of 15k over the past couple of years to prove it....).

 I know you will not like to spend another 100-150 bucks on this, but there are bed-bug sniffing dogs that are supposedly much more reliable than just a visual inspection by the Orkin man.  They will issue a certificate that says "no bedbugs present" (if there really aren't any).  If you do have the bugs and go ahead with treatment, then you bring back the dog afterwards, and make sure the bugs are gone.

Realistically, unless you have such a certificate, you can't really prove that the bugs were not there when the tenants moved in and so, for all intents and purposes, you are stuck dealing with it and footing the bill (unless the tenants volunteer to split).  I had a case similar to this - was almost 100% sure the tenants brought in the bugs, consulted an attorney, and still ended up letting the tenants out of the lease and treating the place on my own nickel.  The key point my attorney made was that bedbug cases are a relatively new problem (they got almost eradicated during the DDT days, but then slowly bounced back since the DDT ban), so courts/judges are quite unpredictable and often end up siding with the tenant.  I think a "bedbug and vermin amendment" will not do much good, unless you have the place certified (by the bug-sniffing dogs) before every new tenant moves in.  I very seriously considered this, but the cost is obviously significant.  So far, I have not had another problem (knock on wood!)

 You definitely need to consult your local laws and, most of all, the existing lease.  m2m doesn't mean you can kick him out in 20 days or less in most cases.  Typically, the lease will spell out terms such as a notice period (often 30 days or even 60 days).  Sometimes, you'll have terms such as termination dates (i.e. lease always runs through the end of a month).  So, for example, if you have a 30day notice and the lease runs through end of month then the earliest you could get out the tenant would be the end of the month following the month you give notice, or maybe even the month after that, depending on how the lease is written.  You will have to comply with whatever the lease spells out.

I definitely agree with GregS and others: no need to offer cash for keys upfront.  Just terminate the lease according to the terms, and chances are they'll abide by the contract and go.

 Exactly!

@Atwan Kwan

There are pesticides you can apply that work well for centipedes, but if you only see one or two of these occasionally, you can set out some glue traps and that will more than likely do the trick.  

example: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003ORTFH0/ref=o...

If you have a lot of them, try sealing cracks in walls/outlets/etc and keep the humidity below 50% (these fellows seem to prefer moist climates, in my experience).

you need a new realtor

These are house centipedes.  Not particularly dangerous and usually pretty shy.  They are VERY fast moving, so hard to catch.  

https://arthurevans.wordpress.com/2010/03/21/house...

@Atwan Kwan