All Forum Posts by: Silvio Brigliadoro

I ask for 6 months of complete bank statements, business and personal and carefully look at all transactions, tax returns helps, but they can also be fakes. Excellent 3-6 year rental references is by far the area I focus on. I always cross reference and verify landlord name and phone number with the that of the owner of the property; many prospective tenants with bad references often use friends to pose as their previous landlords.  Not sure about this prospective tenant, I would look carefully at assets, lines of credits, etc. joint and personal, as the separation could trigger a BK and I wouldn't want to be cought in the middle specially if I could find better qualified tenants. 

A third alternative might be to write a new rental agreement and addendum with small monthly rent increases until you get to the desired rent. One lump rent increase might trigger an unwanted vacancy. Also I would check the laws in your state as there might be certain procedures to follow prior to being able to increase the rent more than say 10%+

Proper tenant selection, meetings with prospective tenants and talking about expectations and house rules will take care most of these issues before they come up, the rest will require some tenant training. What has worked for me very well is the fact that I almost never speak with tenants about repairs, at signing we go over the instructions in my rental agreement on how to go about maintenance requests, expectations and possible delays. I respectfully instruct and train tenants not to call and instead send the requests online. I then forward the request to whoever is going to do the repairs. I also make sure the house is in proper working order or properly repaired, this cuts down on repeat maintenance calls...    

I'm all for training tenants by immediately enforcing rules I have on the lease or rental agreement; a "maintenance notification" clause, a "how funds are applied" clause, etc. are all good clauses to have in the contract. In my state I can just serve a notice for the unpaid portion of the rent. Your second post is more troubling to me as these tenants may not be a fit for your property, another way to "train" tenants might be to send a 30 day notice increasing the rent.

If you have never prepared a 3 day notice before, I would use a process server prepare & serve the notice to your tenant. If the 3 day notice isn't properly filled out your entire eviction process could be dismissed due to improperly filling out that simple form. 

Increasing the rent to get rid of certain tenants could sometimes work out better as they might be the ones making the decision to leave...

@Paul C. If you are actively acquiring properties building a rental portfolio, you may want to focus on whatever it is you do best, and having one more vacancy might be a distraction. I prefer not to hold tenants "hostage" in my rentals with long leases, I try to keep my rents attractive so that they do not want to leave, that keeps my management time under control. Just my 2 cents..

Your rent is too low.

MARY CLEMENT-HILL, I didnt read every single reply... If you did not address rules for storage or maintaining certain access areas of the premises clear from storing belongings and if you have a rental agreement, I would send tenants a 30 day notice changing the terms of tenancy adding the new house rules; unless is not allowed in your state, this will take care of this issue. I would not worry about having to be polite, storing boxes near gas lines would be a safety concern to me.

Mike Franco, I absolutely spell out in plain english which are renter's and landlord's responsibilities in a custom addendum that I attach to my rental agreements. I would not include a gardener unless my property was more of a step up type property, I do include a clause that if at anytime the lawn is not maintained by the resident that I can hire a gardener to maintain it and increase the rents to cover for this extra expense.

I inspect the grounds and property every couple of months on my new rentups and if I see any signs of distress they get served notices immediately enforcing the rules set in the lease/agreement.

I would find out why they want to sell, then I would explain all of the benefits I am able to offer them. I doubt they would just give you their equity for nothing in return.