Had a tenant push the boundaries on me.

Delivered a 3 day pay or quit notice on Friday evening to clueless husband, rent was due on the 10th. Last night I texted the wife and told her that I was headed to file this morning. Different than usual, I also told her that once I file I can not accept rent payment and they will be forced to move. That lit a fire under them, I had rent and late fees first thing this morning. I guess I just assumed that tenants understood that there's a no return point for me once it's filed, but laying it out in no uncertain terms seemed to get their attention. I don't want to get in the habit of babysitting rent payments so I told her it better be on time next month without a follow-up from me because I don't chase rent like other landlords, I will simply cut them loose if they are late again. I'm hoping they just needed a little re-training on how I do business, guess I'll find out next month.

I know this won't work in all situations but this is one of my lower level class C rentals and particularly the wife knows she won't find another unit as nice as the one they are in. Pretty sure she was desperate and borrowed some money from someone but it doesn't affect me one bit.

I rarely have to post a cure/quit notice so you all probably already knew this, but I learned the importance of letting tenants know my point of no-return.

After I send the Non-Payment of Rent notice, but before I have my attorney file eviction in court, I text the tenant that I will be making a PUBLIC court filing for eviction due to non-payment of rent.

MikeA,

Retrain is right! So many LLs let folks slide they don’t understand actually paying RENT on time. (They DO know to pay cellphone, etc on time but LLs are different)

I believe the real issue is retraining the LL.

Our system is simple. My lease is clear and this clause is read to them, they initial it: ‘Management does not accept late or partial payments. Unpaid rent will immediately trigger sheriff eviction’

We send our 3 Day text and they pay. Done.

Very few if any are filed now, down from an average of 4 per month.

And our stress level is down to ZERO!

BRAD

MikeA, thank you for your post, and I am so glad that your tenants paid their rent and even their late fees. I hope that indeed they are now trained and will pay rent on time, being inline with Brad's Zero Tolerance. If not, you just need to head to their place to serve the Pay-or-Quit notice. You don't even need to let them know. The downside about that is that at least for California is that no late fees can be added. As Dee noted, you could just send a dry message if there is a next time to let the tenants know that you will serve them a notice. It seems like they jump and pay everything, including fees.