A couple of questions that I can't find ans to under the LL state sect here Re sect 8 ,..Can you raise their rent to make them to want to leave? I understand that there is a approved amount for rates,..but it doesn't seem to take in acc out that you pay for heat and hot water (big units) not practical to change but another LL said one could raise it, and the tenant would have to pay the extra,.I couldn't find a reference to that here,.

But regarding heat can you change terms under providing heat to section 8 or not,..would you then have change rent ,Also ,...Can you change terms if NOT a sect 8?

Thinking maybe to shutting off the top 2 units of people I want to get rid of,.( I have spent 10s of thounds in legal fees to get them out, but they are stil there..maybe leaving hot water radiators in place for my choice to turn them back on,.in Te future if I ever wanted to,..and putting in electric baseboards,..(rt now they claim they have no control of their heat despite its always in legal range when we check it,.unless we find some radiators shut off,..now they have learned to deny access to us until time to they turn them on,.but we hid some auto transmission wireless thermometers in their units. But we think they turn them off and turn the on right before they call the BOH making sure they see how cold I is,.. they have said they would like it around 80,..and walk around in their under where,...)

Even though we have an overly-robust amount of government housing in our area, I was looking at getting into S8 for one of my niche properties.

But when I saw what they were claiming as a utility allowance-- those numbers might have made sense when I was in grade school, but I decided that perhaps wasn't the path for me.

When you chat with your local office, how does the conversation go?

hummm "sell" always the easiest to say,.so .would YOU buy it? I doubt it if you knew the 2 people there,.they are friends and have learned a lot of tricks about how to screw the LL.

,. ,..even have a few books about that.Suggest you get a few of them and see what someone could do ,...of the 3 lawyers that deal with only LL-tenant relations/law,I have used 2 said they have never seen anything like them ,

This must be area dependent as the rents are higher around here for S8. I don’t have many but that’s because they can’t generally meet the other criteria.

I've never rented to section 8, but my understanding is that you can request a rent increase XX days before lease renewal, and if sec8 doesn't approve it the tenant has to move out. Are the rules different in MA?

Agreed, utility allowances don't even come close to covering the actual cost.

I believe the standard for changing lease terms is that you can do it when the lease approaches the renewal date. Know your local laws about what specific notice has to be given.

Wondering why you're asking these basic questions of us rather than your MA lawyers?

Okay to ken,.. was in a accident several years ago and I can along Highway walk around the property myself. I suppose I could hire someone but on a daily basis that would probably be pretty expensive. As far as turning off the water? Massachusetts here that would generally get you a huge daily fine. It seems the judges here hate landlords and feel sorry for the "poor tenants" ...as far as asking my Massachusetts lawyers,.. Well I have done that with all three of them that I hired over these years,.recommended by the local landlords Association. I asked my secretary how much we paid in legal fees concerning them. She said she would have to go back and look it up over the last seven years on these people but she thinks it must come to about 50,000. I would have to go to the office and check but she is usually very accurate.

JS... one of them hasn't paid for a bit over six years.She is still there,.

With three lawyers, that I have used,. I don't know if they are all just stringing me along or they really can't do much. I noticed that landlords from other states don't seem to grasp the problems we have here. At least in my county.

It seems like getting a lawyer would be your best and only legal solution. It is a shame that you have hired 3 and not gotten any results.

You are in Massachusetts. It is not a landlord friendly state so you have to be really sure to rent to qualified people. Section 8, by definition, are not qualified people.

Not paying rent makes them squatters. Hire a squatter to squat on the squatters. Look that up on you tube.

It sounds like it is a multi unit building. Make parking a privilege. Only people who pay can park in the the parking lot. If you don't pay, your car gets towed.

Skunk spray?

Down here, some of the members from church would have a chat with the non rent payers and that usually fixes the problem.

"one of them hasn't paid for a bit over six years.She is still there" but your strategy is to raise the rent?

Are you getting funds from s8, but they're not paying their portion?

What does your s8 office say?

If they're in violation, how do they stay in the program?

So it can they will purposely break things, and the judges and the Board of Health believe that these things are our fault and responsibility. There signed statements of condition when they moved in that stated things were absolutely excellent. no bad condition Despite having pictures of all rooms doesn't seem to count,. They are very savvy probably because of their books on how to stick it to the LL and not be evicted,.ie They put glue on the window tracks making it impossible to open them. The Board of Health cited us for that.,Inoperable windows,..the BOH and the judge wants 52 windows REPLACED.. They have sabotaged the toilets which were running fine. Again played with the radiators to make them cold in the winter right before they called the Board of Health. we were cited for a too cold unit. Cited for not allowing them into the celler to access their electrical panel. The reason why we locked it was because a number of tools and other things were missing after they moved in.

Note we feel they purposely blow breakers to make this an issue. We send people out there usually within an hour to trip the breaker but back that wasn't good enough for the local Board of Health and we were cited for not allowing them to have Access to the basement. A number of other things that we feel were orchestrated. None of our other buildings have these problems but they have learned that in Massachusetts if you get cited for these that tenant can withhold rent. And they do it often, one seems to do it every single month. That tenant claims that she puts all rent arrears in escrow. But we are pretty sure she has not.

Again the lawyers we have used are supposed to be lawyers that do evictions as a specialty, so we are told again by the local landlords Association.

That's why I'm thinking about changing heat,..shutting off radiators and converting to electricity to force a move,..You can't turn off water,you can't stop trash pick up ,you have to provide parking ,at this point IF you could get someone to squat,... it might be dangerous,we find the male likes guns and now we find out he was released from the army for anger issues and no, it didn't show on any scans

no, I may not have made that clear the one that has obtained a writ of that time is not the section 8. The section a person has had her rent paid by the agency, but she only pays a small portion of it. But she such a pita that we would like to get rid of her also for number of reasons. Hoping that if we increase the cost of both staying there they will move. We can't turn off their electric, but the electric company can or make it so expensive they would like to clean. Trying to figure out if that is even possible to turn it over to have been shoulder the burden of the electrical costs. These are big apartments. More square footage than the average house in Massachusetts. Not cheap to keep especially in the northern part of Massachusetts.

I don't think other landlords have these problems in Massachusetts. It's more of a local thing. For instance the Board of Health with this building is located has made friends with the non-payer and believes everything she says about deficiencies of her unit. Then there is the judge who has insisted that he stay on this case. Like this project is to go after this sketchy landlord. People will see the interior of these units have explained how beautiful it is. Now not quite so much as to have caused problems and issues that point to the fact that they don't have to pay rent. As I said before, one of the books that she has states you can always find problems with your unit because you can cause them and they give you directions on what you can give to do that.

we have other buildings outside this area and have no problems with them.

That's why I'm thinking changing the heat source might be a way to reclaim these units by making it too expensive for them to stay. Does anybody know if this can work for can it be made to work? Shutting down the radiators and installing baseboard electric?

it would be relatively easy to reconnect the hot water radiators when they leave and also anyone complaining that on the day when they felt they needed more heat they could hit up the electric to bump up more heat...

Section 8 housing allowances have a certain amount allocated for specific utilities so the heating allowance should cover heating on a typical unit. If your place isn't typical, then at the next renewal, don't sign anything.

ANYONE think that converting the heat to electric could be a tool to work? I'm thinking that some of LLs here must have put in electric heat at some time,..Maybe after their older systems failed.

Ken,... I'm telling ya,.. that wouldn't work at this place. The male there (now) we find is a gun enthusiast. Discharged from the Army as being dangerous. None of that came up in general screening.a couple of years ago he was cited for discharging a gun in town,..also wavining one at a neighbor,..but only given a warning,

sending some people out to squat would probably get the landlord thrown in jail. and thats if the attempted squatters didn't get shot, the police would question them and they would surely give you up. Then their friend the good old judge would come down on you with everything he could.strong-arm stuff wouldn't work at this place. In fact they would use it to their advantage

As far as screaning,...they actually came up pretty good, that's because the prior landlord desperately wanted to get rid of them and totally lied about their past relations with them. Claimed they were the salt of the earth, paid on time, because no troubles etc. again, these people are real pros know how to slip by screening processes. Over the years I have probably had 100+ tenants. Nothing at all like these people.

again, these two units each have more square footage than the average house in Massachusetts three bedrooms, large living room, large dining room, good sized kitchen, good size bathroom. It's located in the cold mountain area and would be costly to heat the especially by electric.

They have been getting heat paid for,for free. I can't imagine these people would like to stay if they had to pay for their own heating costs. Electric heat in this part of the country is pretty expensive.

I don't see how you could change their heat to electric and not the rest of the building.

One would think they would tell the friendly judge that you were singling them out.

I know that Mass is very pro-tenant. I assume you are not allowed to just non-renew.

Maybe the idea of renovations is the best option? Unless you have to let them back in once completed. But if that is the case never complete the project.

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If you are not willing to embrace any of them, collectively we wish you the best of luck in your land lording path. There really isn't much more anyone can do to assist. Somehow you got into this log jam. It would be my hope that this can be a moment for reflection at a minimum, but if this is no one's fault - what do you suppose is going to happen.

Have you been renewing their lease? Not sure on you laws, in Michigan when the lease is ending we send them a DC 100c form and advise that their lease has ended.

Another scenario my Lawyer used during Covid was that at this time I’m going to sell the property, after their lease ends they need to move and I will turn over the property for sale. I did get the property back, turned it over, and “at that time” I made a business decision to rent the property. Hope that makes sense.

There are lawyers--ones who are good at what they do--and a lot of them that learn as they go on your dime. Find a good one.