Last August, I sold a rental house to a husband and wife who told me at the closing table they were new investors and they had bought my house to learn the ropes of being landlords. They had looked at several houses in this neighborhood but chose to buy my house because it had a rent paying tenant already living there. I told the M&P buyers here,...'you will not have any problems collecting the $700.00/month rent from his single female tenant'. Also, at the closing table, I encouraged these new landlords to get some education on how to manage tenants and where on the Internet (this site of course) to find it. They said they would and they thanked me for the advice.

Now fast forward to today (7 months): Last Saturday I was in this neighborhood and I drove by the house I sold to the married couple. The first thing I noticed was the grass was 3-4 feet high!

I pulled into the driveway and it was obvious the house was vacant. There was a lock on the outside gas meter and water meter too. What really got my attention was an Eviction Notice posted on the front door with my former tenant's name on it that said "You are in default in the amount of $3,500.00" (5 months x $700.00 =$3,500) .

The following day, just out of curiosity, I called my former tenant to ask her,.."What in the h@#? happened?" Her cell phone still rings but apparently she is not taking any calls from me anymore. Maybe she is pissed at me for giving her a new landlord. I am clueless.

What was her employment?

If she stopped paying rent in Nov/Dec, did she get downsized?

I had a good track record with this tenant paying rent. One reason I tried to call her was to see if she would be willing to rent one of my other houses that is not for sale.

Again, I have virtually no facts as to what happened here in the last 7 months. Without any facts, it is easy for most LL's here to blame the tenant. However, my strong gut feeling says what happened here was the result of 2 newbie landlords making a series of 'rookie mistakes'.

Assuming rookie mistakes,...what could have they been?

You want guesses? My guess is that you were always fair but firm with these tenants and they respected you and felt they were getting value for their rent money.

Possibly, they lost jobs or maybe the new landlords ticked them off. Or maybe they were reading the internet one day and realized that there was really no reason at all to pay rent.

Oregon,

Our moratorium lasted 2 months, May and June of last year. Courts here opened July 1st and on July 2nd I evicted my only Moratorium deadbeat who refused to pay May rent only because the Governor of AL said I could not evict her.

Still Learning - No actual eviction here. The notice on the door was a 7-day Pay/Quit notice dated 4-7-21 but this tenant had already moved out several months ago. There is no need to post a P/Q notice on a vacant/abandoned house.

I think the last thing I would be doing is now looking at this now deadbeat tenant and offering her another place.

JB,

I will not assume anything negative about my former tenant until I can get information from her about what happened. That may never happen. She is not a deadbeat from my point of view. There is no evidence here.

I would call the new LL and and tell them you drove by and what you saw and see what the say.

Pretty funny. Roy, you are willing to accept the word of your ex-tenant on exactly what happened and want her back as a T. On the other hand, you don't even want to hear the story from the new LLs who have had to post an eviction notice against your old T.

Not enough info to know but my guess is as good as any.

Gkarl,

Peyton Place.

Move on, already.