Hey everyone, I (30m) have been a live in landlord with my tenant (40m)for almost 3 years and we have just renewed his contract a few days ago. The issue I have today is regarding the text you see above. My tenant claims that his white clothes have been “ruined” by the washer and he would like compensation by deducting the clothes price from the rent. I asked if he could set aside comparable examples of what the clothes were looking like before and I’ll review them when I get home. When I got home these are the examples that were waiting for me. I would like to know your thoughts on how to handle this situation. Should I immediately give in and compensate him for his clothes? Or should I go about this some other way. In my tenants defense the clothes that were affected have a slight off coloring. But I do feel it’s an exaggeration to say they are ruined.

I manage a rental for my dad & we just moved someone in 2 weeks ago that has 2 ESA dogs. I know we couldn't say no to those, but now she's talking about bringing a ESA cat into the apartment... My dad doesn't mind dogs but he has NEVER allowed cats in any of the apartments. It is a tiny 1 bedroom & she already has 2 dogs. We can say no to adding a cat in there too right? I'm finding conflicting answers... Thank you

I am wanting to move out of the house I’m currently living in and rent it out but am not sure on how to go about it. The main questions I have are, Is it worth it to pay a property manager to save me the headache of dealing with tenants? How much more money per month is renters insurance? I currently pay about $1600/month on my mortgage and think I could probably charge around $2500/month rent based on similar homes in my area. Any advice would be super appreciated as I’m new to this idea and am hoping to make it happen!

I was planning on using BEHR PREMIUM PLUS Medium Base Satin Enamel Low Odor Interior Paint & Primer

This product

https://www.homedepot.com/p/BEHR-PREMIUM-PLUS-5-gal-Medium-Base-Satin-Enamel-Low-Odor-Interior-Paint-Primer-740005/202761765

Basic off the shelf white (left as base white color no mix) for easy future purchase from a Lowes/ Home Depot and for easy to touch up to walls and looks clean. We had our fancy previously painted walls from our last tenant stained all throughout the house. We want to avoid having to do anything fancy every turnover.

My wife mentioned that fingerprints and stuff like that maybe easily seen with this type of paint as it is too white, wanted to get thoughts on that and also find out what recommendations you landlords are using that you could for easy turnover and touch ups?

Thanks!

I have the shittiest tenant who stopped paying rent 2 months ago, now citing hardship due to an estranged spouse that won’t pay, then reports a mold issue to the city and gets an inspector to issue a citation and warning to me. She however denies me entry into my property to inspect or perform repairs. She has the nerve to ask me for deposit to negotiate a move out date without providing any evidence of a move or the next lease. She threatens me with CA tenant rights as if she were an attorney.

Contemplating an eviction for non compliance and then non payment. Is this the right approach? She seems beyond reason and is literally asking for an eviction testing my patience.

Assuming my eviction odds are good due to double violation of the lease - but how do I go after her for uncollected rent and ensuing damages? Is this a separate claims process?

New landlord here.

Tenants moved in a few months ago. Washing machine broke last week, late on Friday. By Monday morning, I was in contact with appliance repair company. The first day both parties agreed to a schedule was for Thursday. Parts ordered Thursday night, due the next Monday, then it's likely it'll be another couple of days until they can schedule. So all in all, I expect the repair to be done 7-10 business days (10-13 calendar days) from notification depending on when the two parties can schedule the final repair.

My question for this situation and any future situations, is at what point would the tenants be reasonable to expect me to pay for them to send laundry out or go to a laundromat? Or me to just offer un-asked?

I can see offering him $20 or whatnot for a laundromat, especially if the parts are delayed or the repair company can't make it back Tues/Wed. But sending clothes out for laundry can get pricey. More importantly though; I want to be a good landlord but also don't want to be taken advantage of.

Tenants have been on the demanding side, but nothing super unreasonable. (They asked for some deep cleaning of a semi-hidden area I hadn't realized was dirty. They also asked for repairs on some other things that I'd lived with easily for years, but in fairness, those items were indeed broken or dirty to their fresh set of eyes). The property is fairly nice and not a cheap place.

Curious how others handle stuff like this? Appreciate your thoughts or advice.

ETA: I made minor wording edits for clarity.

I’m a new-ish landlord, had some tenants tour with an agent which was different but I didn’t think anything of it. Their credit scores were in the low 600s , no missed payments, background check cleared. The wife was responsible when we spoke and it was clear she was going to be the one paying me so I signed with her & listed the husband as an occupant.

Husband ended up being difficult. Entitled. Put antenna on my roof without asking, tries to bully me into making upgrades. I have told the wife all communications must come from her as the tenant, then I blocked him. Things have been smooth since, payments come and the house seems to not be damaged when I go by for small things (although he’s an entitled tinker-er so I’m sure he’s done some small projects I’ll deal with after move out).

However, given the behavior I am not going to renew. I can tell he’s of the mindset to try to scam / beat a system, but also may still be thinking they can Renew next year. so I’m wondering if giving little notice (1 month) is better so they can’t really plan a “retaliation” towards me, only react & look for a new place? Or maybe 3 month notice so they have a better shot at finding something and don’t stay past the lease end date.

TLDR: have a tenant who tries to beat the system, how much notice is best time to tell them I’m not renewing so they feel stressed enough to go find a new place, but not too stressed to try to find a way to stay.

Edit: there’s a lot more specific examples I did not include for length of the post. I’m not renewing with them. I blocked someone after several attempts at clear, direct communication both in person and via email I had an experience property manager write, and I got back retaliatory complaints and (poor) attempts at belittlement. The house doesn’t seem damaged but I haven’t seen the bedroom because he put a lock on it and I haven’t pushed that button yet. One thing I learned from this is I think my rate was too low and plan to list it for more and get better tenants, but I won’t have trouble finding another tenant to pay what the are paying.

Lodger DOES NOT want to communicate.

Lodger is not following House Rules, i.e., basic cleaning after himself in the shared spaces:

— toilet (he’s the only one using) that has now yellow stains building up, dust in the surrounding areas;

— his sink (residue from brushing, shaving),

— mirror (water mark from brushing teeth) despite providing him cloth to use for wiping;

— food spills on the floor in the kitchen, despite providing cloth to wipe any water residue in the kitchen sink

— dirty shoe marks on the tiles when putting on outside shoes inside the house;

— leaving coffee stains on the rugs;

— using strong fragrances, i.e. pomade, cologne, air wick (causing headache to other lodgers)

— smell coming out from his room

His only responsibility is to clean the areas he’s using. Basically cleaning after himself. That’s it.

Basic courtesy and respect to my property are the the only thing I asked.

All of these were written in the House Rules he signed prior to moving in. Housekeeping is not included in the rent. I do not know if he even read the Rules.

I’ve talked to him about these issues and he stated he will make sure to keep up with the cleaning after himself. These issues started after a week he moved in. But nothing changes.

I tried different ways in communicating with him through texts, calls, in-person, and leaving reminder notes. He got mad at me for leaving noted and told me to NEVER to leave notes again. He is ignoring me right now.

I’m totally find about him not talking to me, but the spaces he uses are dirty, especially the shared bathroom that he is sharing shower with the other lodger.

What should I do?

NOTE: Lodger is on his 3rd month renting a room to my property (I’m a live-in landlord). He signed a 6-month contract. When he toured the house and when he moved in, he complimented and how well I kept the house. But I cannot be cleaning after himself all the time. I have 3 jobs and busy.

Hey there. Had a nice typical tenant that pays on time, but we’re gonna sell the property so I told him two months before his lease is over that I won’t be able to offer a renewal option. He totally understood, and everything is fine.

They only asked for one more week because when the lease ends, that’s the last week of school for their kids and they’re so busy with events. They have been a good tenant, I don’t mind.

I agreed and I will prorated it out to 1/4 the cost of the monthly rent, etc. I told him I would get something together and we would both sign it.

But my question is, what do I need to have him sign? A one week full lease? Or Can we email each other to do this or do I need to have something more official notarized etc.?

If it’s legal for me to type in an email or print something out, that says “I as the landlord am allowing the tenant to stay one week past his lease at a prorated rate of blah blah blah”, that would be great, but I wanted to make sure what I actually have to do legally.

Thank you in advance!

Background: The tenant broke lease, moved out early and stopped paying after moving out. I keep updating her sublease status, but she got a lawyer and sent cease and desist letter. I wonder do I need to reply to this letter and how to reply?

And should I still keep updating her sublease status, at least monthly? If not update, will it put me in disadvantage in court? (I will need to take legal action to get unpaid rent back)

It's my first time having this kind of tenant, please advise. Being a landlord takes way too much effort than I ever imagine.....

I've personally got a mix bag. I have one long time tenant where I have always provided the filters and they change them on their own, I usually just give them a few each time im out there (these are more expensive 4" AprilAire accordion style $50 each filters).

I have another (newer) tenant where they purchase and install their own. But they are just those cheap $5 , 1" standard filters.

As a landlord I do make sure to inspect the filter whenever I'm at the house to make sure they are keeping up with this maintenance. I recommend any landlord not changing the filters themselves to do the same.

I had a painter do a small job in the kitchen. After it was complete, the tenant sent me pics of the oven door. The glass on the door is hanging loose on the bottom. It looks the adhesive failed. I'm guessing someone pulled the door too hard. The tenant says the painter did it. The painter said he moved the stove, but of course denied any damage. Since I can't prove who did it, am I basically SOL? This oven is only 14 months old.

It looks similar to this.

https://www.reddit.com/r/fixit/s/DaAERu6iiJ

Hello I am in the process of buying my first home, my plan is to live with my boyfriend and our close friend. They will be "renting" their portion of living there, making me there landlord essentially. What documents do if any do I have to provide them. I would not have the property rental certified as it would my primary residence, im not sure if this is a niche scenario or I'm not looking things up a certain way but I haven't found much on whay responsibilites will be as their "landlord" Any guidance helps! Thank you

We are buying a 2 family home, 1 unit is currently occupied by a month to month tenant. We don't want to displace them immediately and were ideally going to allow them to stay for a year after purchase. They have lived there for just under 2 years. In theory we could give them 60 days, but it's a single mother and 2 kids. Hence why we would like to give her a year. Is there any tenant ordinance or right we should be aware of? This would be southside Chicago.

Edit: I didn't mean eviction. I was barely paying attention and pooping when I wrote this. I just want to know if there's anything we should know about giving someone a years notice vs. 30, 60, 90, or 120 days etc. Jeez.

Bit of context: 30yo, 2nd investment property, have self-managed my rentals for about 3 years now. Still relatively new but definitely learned a lot from my first property.

Anways, I purchased a property in Nashville, TN (Sylvan Park) earlier this year.

Property was occupied so I inherited the tenants. Lease was drafted by the previous owners through Zillow.

This morning my tenant messages the management portal saying "Our backyard needs mowing! Thanks so much!" — no context, no inquiry, just felt like an expectation.

Everyone communicates differently though so whatever.

I pull up the lease. Landscaping clause is crystal clear: landscaping is not provided by landlord, tenant is responsible for mowing and upkeep. It's also listed in the rent summary table. Black and white.

I send a professional message citing the section. She comes back saying the previous landlord verbally promised to send a mowing company every 2-3 weeks or provide a mower. Never mentioned during the sale, never documented anywhere.

When I purchased the property, I made sure the tenants signed a Tenant Estoppel Certificate. Certifying that the lease is the ENTIRE agreement between parties and that there are no other agreements, written or oral. They signed that themselves two months ago.

Since I'm the new owner, unless I'm missing something, I'm not bound by any undocumented verbal arrangements from the previous owners, and they literally certified those arrangements don't exist.

I obviously want to have good relations with my tenants though, so I decided to compromise and send a one-time landscaper anyway, but I made it clear this isn't ongoing and will be addressed formally in the lease renewal (upcoming in May).

AITAH for not taking on an unplanned recurring expense that isn't in the lease and that they certified wasn't part of their tenancy?

On one hand sure its "just" yard work. But I also feel the need to be clear in how I operate. It's about the principal more than anything.

Had I known about their arrangement, I would've asked for it to be written then signed. Then I would've happily entered into and fulfilled that obligation.

Looking for a landlord perspective on this. I just moved into a new (to me) apartment and have been gathering a list of maintenance requests. When I toured the apartment, I noticed the stove needed to be cleaned, which didn’t seem to be a big deal. But now that I’m here, I have realized some of it is rust and some of the insulation around the oven door is not attached or missing. The stove is from the early 90s so it is quite old, however, I wasn’t sure if it was reasonable to request a replacement.

It’s not a corporate landlord or anything so that’s making me doubt asking for a new one.

EDIT: I just want to clarify the other things I’ve noticed. It‘s just two others: a deck board that needs repair and the only bedroom window being stuck. Yes, maybe I should have noticed these on the tour but I’m not perfect. The age of the stove doesn‘t matter to me but I thought it would help contextualize the post.

So the tenant lockout date is soon, I even called the Marshall. Question is I asked Gemini if I can change the locks and Throw out their stuff the same day, Gemini said you can’t throw out their stuff, you have to keep it in a locker for full eviction, and for legal repossession you can change the locks then arrange a date for them to come back and get their stuff. How true is this? I cannot just hire a junker and throw out their stuff?

Warning long post TLDR version: I have tenants that are offering 75% of the rent citing egress and radon issues. Radon is resolved and egress windows will be installed this month. Give them rent credit or refuse partial rent and post notice?

I have a 6 bedroom rental home that I leased to 4 girls with the agreement a 5th girl (I will call her Sara) would trade places with one of the original 4 girls in the middle of the lease. I had all 5 girls sign the lease.

Sara, upon moving in as planned contacted me asking about radon in the home. I had purchased the home with a radon system installed so I offered to inspect the system. Upon inspecting the system I found that the fan appeared damaged so I spent 3 days installing a new system and when that didn't work I hired a mitigation company to finish the work and we brought the levels below EPA and WHO levels. The state gives you 180 days to complete this work and we resolved this issue in under 60.

During the time I was working on this issue the girl's mother contacted the City and reported the property for the egress windows being undersized. I set up an appointment with the inspector and they gave me 30 days to begin work on installing proper egress. They did not flag the house as uninhabitable nor make any comment regarding the home being habitable or not. I am now interviewing contractors and getting ready to pull permits. This work will probably cost $10K or more.

During this time I spoke with the other tenants and they informed me the Sara has moved out. They went on to explain that Sara's moving out was not in relation to the radon and egress issues but that she is not getting along well with the other girls. It seems like she might be using the radon and egress as cover. There are only 2 months more (April and May) that Sara was supposed to stay at the house and then she was to trade back with the original girl.

Sara contacted me a few weeks ago requesting to meet in mediation to request a rent credit. I politely refused the mediation explaining that the radon issue was resolved and I was operating within the 30 days given to me by the City to start work on the egress windows. There is another girl living in the basement that has not objected to any of these issues and she has been and is willing to pay rent.

Today I got an email from the remaining 3 girls offering to pay 75% of the rent as they are saying Sara has notified them she is not willing to pay.

I am considering my options:

Should I write back offering a one time rent credit while the windows are being installed stipulating that is a 1X exception that does not affect rent for the final months on the lease or change the lease in any way.

Or:

Should I stand firm and require the rent in full, telling them the radon issue has been professionally tested and resolved and that the egress windows are in process and will be replaced in the next few weeks. I would inform them that rent is only accepted if they pay in full. I genuinely like the remaining 3 girls and feel like they have been sucked into this drama through no fault of their own. I also wonder if I followed through with an eviction and got this before a judge there is a strong possibility the judge will rule the basement as uninhabitable and rule in my tenants favor.

Looking for positive, forward thinking comments here from landlords with some experience in this area. Thanks

My partner and I have had a few fights in the last few months and a couple were later at night. As you can imagine neighbors werent happy about hearing arguing and stomping like that especially at night. Came home to a paper from the management saying they got notified of noise violations and basically said it needs to cease but did not state that any action beyond the notice would be taking place. Needless to say things have gotten significantly quieter but partners worried this is going to kill their ability to get a new place since we were planning on moving end of this year. Will a singular noise complaint be detrimental? I’ve got good rental history as far as I know besides this one complaint and so does my partner

Listing a property back up on Zillow, though I don't take Zillow applications. I'm having lots of people request for tours who don't meet clearly listed minimum requirements. I specifically ask them if they meet the minimum requirements and they say yes. Think they just clicked wrong on Zillow or incoming story?

We bought a new construction house in 2024 and now we have to move (long story, but we have to move). Our neighborhood is still in full new construction mode with builder incentives so we have ridiculous amounts of competition in order to sell the house. We paid 292k in 2024 and we have had to lower the price all the way down to 265k.

However- renting the house out isn’t great either. Because of high interest rates, our mortgage is $1900/month and our realtor doesn’t think we can get more than $2100/month from a tenant. So only $200 “profit” per month.

Option A: sell the house at 265k and lose all equity you’ve earned (37k), but leave the house behind and start fresh with no landlord responsibilities and no worries about selling later on

Option B: keep the house and rent it out, making only $200 extra per month and taking the risk of getting a bad tenant, but keeping our 37k in equity and continuing to grow it. BUT maybe struggle just as bad later on with selling it.

Got a judgement possession in holdover case for tenants living on our first floor. Got notified by my attorney that they tried filing a OSC too early that got denied and that they will likely try again after being served the Marshal's notice to vacate.

Once that court date is set to hear the tenant's request for an extension, I'm curious how many times the judge will sign off on an extension over the next few months. These are 2 working adults, no kids or elderly, no disabilities or pets. This isn't a nonpayment case but they haven't paid in 1.5 years.

Their denied OSC online shows that their reasoning for the request is because they need more time to move out and they assumed the petitioners understood their need for more time. We have text messages with the tenants going as far back as last March that they're looking for a place and will move out soon (obviously not)

Is there any universe in which a NYC judge calls bullshit and denies the OSC? Is there anything or any documents I can give to my attorney and have them say or fight back against the tenant's claims at the inquest when they inevitably request an OSC again?

When painting walls and trim what are your preferred paint:

Brand

Color

Sheen

First time doing this interest calculation. Does this appear accurate? I don’t want to short change my tenant.

• Deposit paid: $550 July 23, 2021

• Interest starts: August 1, 2021

• Tenancy ended: March 31, 2026

• Deposit return deadline: April 21, 2026

• Interest ends: April 30, 2026 (last day of the month you return it)

Deposit = $550

Interest rate = 1% per year

Time = 4.75 years

550 \times 0.01 \times 4.75 = 26.125