Eviction
The removal of a tenant from possession of premises in
which he or she resides or has a property interest done by a landlord either by
reentry upon the premises or through a court action.
Eviction may be in the form of a physical removal of a
person from the premises or a disturbance of the tenant's enjoyment of the
premises by disrupting the services and amenities that contribute to the
habitability of the premises, such as by cutting off all utility's services to
an apartment. The latter method is known as constructive eviction. An action of
Ejectment is a legal process
by which a landlord or owner of land may seek the eviction of his or her
tenant.
West's Encyclopedia of American Law, edition 2.
Copyright 2008 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
eviction
n. a generic word for the act of expelling (kicking out) someone from real property either by legal
action (suit for unlawful detainer), a claim of superior (actual) title to the
property, or actions which prevent the tenant from continuing in possession
(constructive eviction). Most frequently eviction consists of ousting a tenant
who has breached the terms of a lease or rental agreement by not paying rent,
or a tenant who has stayed (held ohttp://ver) after the term of the lease has expired
or only had a month-to-month tenancy. (See: unlawful detainer, constructive eviction, lease, adverse possession)
Rising
Cost of Rent? Why?
Over the past few years, Rent has nearly doubled in many
areas of the United States. Obviously the first to be blamed is the landlord as
the word landlord in today’s English language has become synonymous with
target. While many things determine the cost of rent and effect it in the
market, we live it is rarely if ever the landlord just wanting more money that
drives it higher and higher at such a quick pace. Several factors affect the
cost of rent. One being the initial cost of the house plus repairs to make it
livable. Another is the cost of maintenance, insurance and taxes on these
properties, and another is compensating for bad renters.
As stated above, overall cost of the initial house directly
effects the cost of rent. Most landlords adhere to the rule of 1%. This states
that to be safe in a property you need to be able to rent the property for 1%
of the total purchase price. Immediate repairs would also need to be factored
into this as well to cover yourself. For example: A house that initially cost $100,000
would need to rent for $1000 per month based on this rule. I personally do not
totally concur with this rule, and I believe after years of investing that you
really need to be bit more aggressive in repaying your initial investment to be
safe but for the purpose of this article the rule of 1% will suffice. This
being as it is, obviously the past few years have seen a drastic increase in
the cost of housing. Rising prices in housing directly equals rising prices in
rent. Very simple and straightforward connection.
Maintenance, insurance and taxes are yet another culprit
that directly affect the cost of rent. This cost may be even more damning that
the initial purchase when it comes to the final tally on a rent contract. With
a house increasing so much in cost and value, insurance is naturally going to
increase to keep up with the insurer’s risk. I can also assure you that your
best buddies in the city government will not miss a great opportunity like a
robust economy and booming housing market to raise your property taxes. Again,
direct connection to rent cost. Also factored in is always general maintenance
which also increases in cost every year. Both parts and labor to keep your
house running as it should increase in cost therefore rent must go up as well
to supply the demand of the necessities.
There is also a third factor that isn’t always talk in
textbook rental property but in fact a real factor into the cost of rent. Bad
tenants! Yes, we may want to avoid them but if you have been in the rental business
for any number of years you have come across some of these and they can be
quite expensive. Bad tenants rent houses
or apartments without an intention of staying long. They travel from landlord
to landlord and prey on people who do not do their due diligence when
performing the tenant selection process. It is important that you preform
tenant screening to try to miss out on some of these guys. Many times, when
these types of people weasel their way into your home they end up doing
significant damages to your house before finally being forced to vacate the
property. In a retail store environment this would be called shrink.
Manufacturing facilities would call it waste but regardless of its name it is a
real business cost and must be factored into the overall cost of the product.
In this case, rent. Bad tenants have a
direct effect on rent cost without a doubt.
As you can see there are numerous factors affecting the
cost of rent in todays environment. Though it may be easy to blame the landlord
or the property manager it is highly likely it is very much out of their control.
Hopefully you found this article helpful and would like to be a part of our
online community of landlords. Be sure to visit us at http://www.undergroundlandlord.com
and refer a few other landlords as well.
Written by: David, The official and original Underground Landlord
Tenant
Selection and Avoiding Eviction Upfront!
Success or failure in the rental business really does come
down to tenant selection. Eviction is a major problem and cost for the
landlord, but the eviction percentage really can be cut by doing the due diligence
in the “Honeymoon Phase” of the rental agreement. I call this part the
honeymoon phase because everyone really is starey eyed and rainbows and
lollypops. These are the perfect tenants, just ask them. Your house is so
perfect for their situation, again, just ask them. This is also the part where
most new and even some more experienced landlords drop the ball.
Eviction processes are never fun. Some states vary in how
these are carried out but they all have one thing in common. IT sucks. Most
states can take 30 days to evict a tenant for non-payment and some can drag it
out much longer. Eviction seems daunting, and it is, but most are avoidable. It
begins at the beginning. You definitely want to get tons of information up
front from a prospective tenant. Name, ss number, drivers license number,
current employer, recent employer, former landlords, criminal background check
and basically any other you want to collect and keep. You will
potentially need this at some point.
Now I am going to give you some pointers I use. First of
all I almost never waste my time calling the previous landlords given to me on
an application. Occasionally I will if I recognize the name but rarely. This is
simple to me. I am only getting landlords they had a good run with, and it may
not be a landlord at all. Most likely if these are “professional tenants” they
will use family or friends to pose as landlords and give them raving reviews.
Granted, I can see through fake landlords easily at this phase in my career but
honestly, I have better things to do.
Employment history however, I do look at very carefully.
How often a person changes jobs can be a very good indicator to how often they
will change houses. I don’t automatically omit someone that made a career
change nor someone who moved to another location for more money or a better
location for them. I do however try to avoid people that have started and
stopped 4 or so jobs within the same fiscal year. Let’s face it, It cost money
to change jobs and if you are the landlord you are probably going to be the guy
that pays that tab ultimately.
I ran into this often early on and that’s what prompted me
to develop and finance Underground Landlord. This is a site to help landlords
avoid eviction at the beginning. http://www.undergroundlandlord.com .This
is how it works and why it’s legal. You the landlord sign up to the website. It
automatically generates a database for you to place tenants in that you have
had issues within the past. YOU
ARE NOT LIMITED TO CURRENT TENANTS ONLY! You will need more information
than simply a first and last name. We are not here to smear people but simply
to accurately rate how a situation ended. Make sure you have all the tenants in
your database that have wronged you.
Now other landlords are filling their databases as well.
Also invite all other landlords in your area to do the same. As you start to
receive new tenant applications run them against the database. If they are in
there it will pull up the landlord or landlords who placed them in there, not
the tenant. We never actually display your tenant or any other tenant’s
information. We display the landlord who placed the tenant in the database to
begin with. Now you and the landlord, you wouldn’t have otherwise known about,
and get their take on the person. As long as the information you are relaying
is true you need not worry about Libel or Defamation charges. These can only
come into play if you are making up or falsifying information to discredit or
harm someone. That is not the purpose of this site. We are simply inviting
Landlords to meet landlords who have tenants or potential tenants in common.
Again you can see we do not actually share your tenants
information. You already were given this information as part of your
application process or at least you should have been. Now the Landlord
searching was also given the information used in the search. What I do just as
a fail safe is put a clause on my application stating that I will in fact use
any and all information collected to perform background checks, both offline
and online for the purpose of qualifying tenants. This site is a catalyst to
connect previous landlords to potential landlords and does so in a legal and
ingenious fashion. While using your arsenal of background checks, information
collection and references make sure to Sign up for Underground Landlord and
invite other landlords in your area. This is a soon to be household tool for
landlords
Avoiding just one disastrous eviction can save you
countless hours of stress and thousands upon thousands of lost rents plus
wasted money to pay for the process. Most of the “professional tenants” in the
world today know all the loopholes and the ones who don’t quickly find them
either by researching the web or finding out from the magistrates office.
That’s right, the very judges set in place often educate the tenants of ways to
screw you the landlord. That is why it is vital that we use sites like
Underground Landlord to unite and combine our efforts. Sign up now and invite a
friend!
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