As an investment property owner, you might have to one day evict bad tenants. The process isn’t exactly fun, but you should know how it works. Learn more about the process in our latest post!
Let’s face it, evictions happen. There is always that one tenant who isn’t holding up their end of the deal, yet they refuse to leave the property. This is when you need to bring in outside help. Keep reading to learn more about how to evict a bad tenant in Atlanta!
Illegally Evicting a Tenant
Before we offer our helpful ideas on evicting a tenant, let’s make something crystal clear: Self-help evictions – of any kind – are illegal.
Not slap-on-the-wrist illegal, but rather you-can-go-to-jail illegal.
A self-help eviction is any intervention the landlord takes to make the property unlivable and/or to try and coerce the tenants to vacate. They include (but are not limited to):
- Changing the locks
- Turning off utilities
- Physically blocking access to the property
- Removing the tenant’s belongings
- Harassment of any kind
- Sending Vinny over to the property with a lead pipe
There is only one legal pathway to forcibly remove tenants from a property: filing for eviction in court.
6 Ways to Get Rid of Tenants Legally
Raise the Rents
Are your tenants annoying, but not actively violating your lease agreement?
Maybe they drive your neighboring tenants crazy or call you every other day to ask you to come to change a light bulb.
If your tenants aren’t actively violating your lease, but you just don’t want to rent to them anymore, consider raising the rent – significantly – the next time their lease comes up for renewal.
Be sure you double-check your state and local laws, though, because some jurisdictions restrict the percent that landlords can raise the rent in a single hike.
One other caveat: If you have a fixed-term lease with a specified ending date, you can’t increase the rent before that date.
Note this technique is far from guaranteed to get your renters to leave your investment property. In other words: What if your tenants actually accept your dramatically higher rents?
Well, at least you’ll be compensated for your troubles.
Non-Renew Their Lease
You don’t have to renew your tenants’ lease when the lease term ends… or do you?
Be careful: In some tenant-friendly jurisdictions, landlords have to justify non-renewing their tenants.
In most cases, though, you can simply send a polite, professionally written notice explaining that the lease is not renewing. Thank them for their time with you, explain your move-out policies (including a move-out condition inspection), and be sure to emphasize how they can ensure they receive their security deposit back.
Most of all, make sure you send non-renewal notices within the legal time window in your state. It could be 30, 60, 90 days or even longer.
Check with your state’s rental/landlord laws (or have a lawyer do so for you).
Provide Help in Finding a New Home
It may sound counterintuitive, but if you want your bad tenants out quickly, you might need to help them find an alternative accommodation.
Show them websites or offline publications to search and review listings. Point out local community services that help residents find housing. If they aren’t inherently terrible tenants and were simply a bad fit for your property, you can even ask around in local landlord and real estate groups and clubs for info on upcoming vacant units.
Just make sure you don’t burn bridges with your fellow local landlords and investors. Don’t lie about an applicant’s history. Instead, try a positive spin… as long as it doesn’t mislead those landlords.
Bring a Full Threat of Legal Pursuit
Just because you can’t send Vinny over with a lead pipe doesn’t mean you can’t threaten (okay… that’s a little extreme, but you get my drift.) You just have to make sure your “threats” are within legal limits.
Either hire an attorney or simply buy your attorney friend a few beers and have them draft a menacing letter to your tenants. Threaten lawsuits, deficiency judgments, ruined credit, collections, and garnished wages.
Send a brutally clear message: there are dire consequences if they don’t correct their lease violations and/or vacate peacefully.
This tactic works best if you’ve already established that you enforce your lease agreement, by serving an eviction warning notice as soon as the rent became late. You must also then file in court for eviction, as soon as the mandatory waiting period ends.
Try serving this threatening letter on the same day you file in court for eviction.
“I filed today in court for eviction. I’m hoping we can resolve this without further legal action, but here are the legal actions we will be pursuing if you do not cure your lease violation.”
Then cue up the threats!
Offer Cash for Keys
This one will stick in your craw… but it’s most certainly an effective (if not the most effective) means of getting awful renters out of your investment properties.
If a full eviction will cost you $4,000 and take the next three months, wouldn’t it be a lot cheaper and faster to just bribe offer your tenants $500 to move out next weekend?
I know, I know. It means rewarding people for their bad behavior. But here’s the thing… remember all those legal threats we talked about above in that threatening letter? In most cases, it will cost you more to pursue deadbeat tenants than it does to simply write off the losses.
Our legal system already allows tenants enormous leeway for their bad behavior. The system is designed to protect tenants, not landlords. If a tenant defaults on their rent, they can either live for free for the next few months while you jump through hoops in eviction court, or they can take your offer and move out earlier.
Either way, they win.
Now, that’s a bitter pill for most landlords to swallow… but again, that’s why prevention is so important.
There’s one crucial caveat with cash for keys though: You must set strict conditions for the offer. They only receive the money if they leave the property spotlessly clean. The same kind of condition they would need to leave it in if they were expecting their regular security deposit back.
This is one of the reasons you’re stooping to this method: If you have to evict them normally, they will leave your property in terrible shape. I guarantee it.
Find (and Prove) Illegal Activity
Ready for the most aggressive tactic to expel terrible tenants?
A recurring theme throughout this article has been consistent enforcement of your lease agreement. We mentioned regular inspections of your rental unit — and here’s one more reason to conduct them:
Many states and municipalities allow for expedited evictions if your tenants are breaking the law.
Granted, you still have to provide advance written notice before entering your property. So, your tenants might arrange to be home when you enter, which will make it more difficult for you to find and prove illegal activity.
But, inspections aren’t the only reason that landlords enter their rental properties. Repairs and maintenance are valid reasons to enter as well. Perhaps now is a good time to service the furnace?
Try to schedule your visits when you expect them to be at work.
Be careful not to cross the line here, though. You can’t ransack your renters’ rooms. Even opening drawers and closets can be considered an invasion of privacy. But it’s surprising how poorly many people hide their drugs and paraphernalia.
And, let’s be honest, there are only so many places you can put a three-foot glass bong.
Snap photos (with the timestamp turned on), notify the local cops and serve the appropriate eviction notice for illegal activity.
Evicting Bad Tenants
A Word of Caution for Evicting
A normal, legal eviction should always remain part of your plan. Use eviction warning notices and court filings to send a loud and clear message to your tenants that you take the lease agreement seriously and will defend it aggressively.
Before you consider evicting someone, try to think of other ways to resolve the issue. Many problems can be solved without the time and cost of evicting them. You can also think of some ways to convince them to move on their own.
For example, you could raise the rent if their lease is up or you could to choose to not renew their lease. Just make sure that anything you do falls within the legal bounds of being a landlord. If you have spoken to them, addressed the issues and are still having problems, you should then think about eviction. It should only be done as a last resort as the time and cost aren’t really in your best interest.
Going through the eviction process is one of the most frustrating things a landlord will have to deal with. It is crucial that you adhere to all procedures and do things the right way.
You don’t want to give your tenant any “outs” when trying to evict them from your home. All proceedings must be done timely and according to the law where your property is located. Review the Landlord Tenant Act to make sure you are in compliance.
You can never do things such as changing the locks, turning off the utilities, or harassing them in any manner. While these might be the things you want to do, doing these kinds of things is against the law, and will only give your tenant more ammo if you end up going to court. Below are the basic steps for filing an eviction notice in Atlanta.
Make Sure Your Reason for Eviction Is Valid
According to the courts, you need to have a good reason for giving them the boot. Document everything to show what they have done and your attempts to resolve the issue. Some valid reasons would include damage to the property, not paying rent as scheduled, they are a nuisance to the neighbors or they have otherwise violated the lease.
Give Written Notice for Eviction
Include the date, planned date you will file an eviction, and the time they will have to correct the problem if applicable. Give to the tenant personally and if that isn’t possible, leave it on their front door.
File The Eviction At Your Local Courthouse
You will need to file the necessary paperwork, pay the filing fee and request a court date. It isn’t always a fast process, so be prepared to deal with stubborn tenants for the next few weeks.
Prepare Your Case
Gather all documents such as proof of non-payment, repair bills, neighbor statements, any records of communication between you and the tenant. Don’t leave anything out. Come to the courtroom prepared. If your tenant is making the effort to stay in the property, they will likely be preparing their side of the argument as well.
The Eviction
Depending on where you live, the tenant will have 2-5 days to vacate the property. If they don’t, this is when you call the police to have them physically removed from the property. Hopefully, you never have to have things go this far.
When owning a rental property in Atlanta, the benefits far outweigh the things that can go wrong. However, as with any investment, it is always best to be prepared for any situation that may arise.
Selling the Rental Property with a Bad Tenant
If you are tired of the headaches of dealing with tenants and don’t want to go through the whole process of evicting a bad tenant, you can sell your house and be done with it.
We buy properties in Atlanta with the bad tenants in them. We will handle the eviction process after we take over ownership of the property. There’s no reason for you to take the time and spend the money to get rid of the bad tenant before selling the property.
Just sell your house today and move on.