Just got a place rented...took forever (3 months?) and some drama. Luckily it has an ADU which more than pays for everything so no financial hardship, just a PITA.

Have another coming up on an End of Lease and he is not renewing because the neighbors complain too much about his dog. Fine, it's a place that normally rents at first showing. But I need to show it to rent it and no one is even inquiring.

Last night I get notice from another tenant they are breaking their lease: she is pregnant, they already have a child and it's a tiny house so Gramma is giving them a trailer. January 1st!

3 months is fabulous! In BLUE states where there is no personal responsibility/accountability, 6 months is turning out to be the minimum for getting a tenant who has a credit score above 600, has good previous landlord references, has a good job/income/savings, is cooperative/stable and is not a complete whack job.

I don't flat out use the ignore button all that often on my phone, but this week I had a humdinger.

Lead works in the oil and gas fields of SE Ohio and I have a place that is roughly two hours away. These folks work two weeks and get 8 days off. He is looking for a place in February. I told him that the property will probably not be available in February. He asked me if I had any other places. I said I would have a place that I am working on now ready about 1 January and another one about his time line. So this lead ask me for picture and details.

I explained that we are still working on these places, the price points will be about the same and the locations are within 20 miles from each other. I asked with him working two hours away, would that be alright.

BOOOM - the guy explodes and goes off cussing at me that I with holding info on him. I explained that the places are being worked on as major rehabs and overhauls. After he dropped the F bomb on me the second time, I wished him the best of luck in his search and hung up.

Ray, might be a good time for all calls to go to voicemail (except mine of course).

Have them look at your website and see what they can see.

Had the same number call me three times last week. No VM left, no text either. I thought I would see if a free phone look up would work and it did.

This woman rented from us years back. It didn't end well. Lots of cussing, screaming and the like.

I hadn't had this scenario for a while, but it just happened again a couple of months ago...

After getting past my "gauntlet" of pre-screening questions during their initial phone inquiry, I agreed to show an apartment to a nice young couple. They liked the place, and we started going through the application right during the showing. I started getting suspicious when she couldn't produce the proof of employment as I had requested her to bring to the showing.

Long story short, after asking her pointed questions about her employment, it became apparent she did not even have a job at the employer she was claiming. I knew what to ask because my wife works at the same place at which the applicant was claiming! So, I actually had a little fun with my questions, and it was amusing to watch them squirm. But I never let on that I knew she was faking it.

It's the holiday season. Decent tenants do not move between Thanksgiving and New year. No one with any brains moves their family during the holidays, plus it tends to be a bad weather time of year. Not a good time to move,

Even the evictees aren't moving because too many judges won't throw a family out on the street over the holidays.

Most often the really good tenants are on leases and leases tend to end in the summer. They are not moving during the winter months. Good tenants don't break their lease, they wait until it expires before they move.

We have this one singlewide that must have a ghost in it that waits until November to run people off!

I had one woman to send me so many e-mails on it I finally told her she had at least 2 evictions that I knew of online and "Our policy ....." That didn't phase her, she wrote back and ask if I didn't believe that people could change AND in the same breath, advised that she filed for bankruptcy last year!

Wow, just wow...... doesn't sound like she's changed to me, sounds like she is still making lots of bad decisions.

Our most expensive place is coming empty in December. Tenants are flaking out in the 4th month of a one year lease. They are expecting to (and telling me) they will pay the ELT. But that still leaves me with a vacancy in December.

The rooming house is humming along with no issues on filling the rooms. It's very different with my apartments. I'm glad I sold off some of my places over the past few years ending most recently with the duplex I sold this summer. The window for selling is going to close if it's not closed already. I really believe my most recent place sold for far more than what it was really worth. Hard to rent and long vacancy means less investor demand. I'm considering section 8 as a viable option now.

We are lowering our prices or at least our expected prices. It's fine, we didn't get that price anyway! We are definitely the cheapest on our local CL (definitely not the nicest either.) Still not getting the action I want, hopefully because of season, but also hoping for better now that Thanksgiving is over. We'll see won't we?

I see having no mortgages as a savings grace at times. I have it mixed. I own some outright and have mortgages on the others.