My tenant is not paying rent in my Denver rental house, what should I do? That’s the question I’m going to answer right now. I’m Matthew Whitaker with evernest. So, let’s jump right in.
The first thing is things you should not do. So, let’s look at what you shouldn’t do.
What you want to do is threaten this tenant, and you should absolutely not do that.
You can call them up, threaten them, harass them. Please, please, please don’t do that.
Judges Do Not Look Kindly
Judges do not look kindly on this, once you have to evict these people. So, I want to make sure that to start out with, is you absolutely do not call them up, threaten them, harass them.
As much as you can, you need to make sure that you maintain a very objective, kind of, business-like handling of the situation. So please don’t call them up, threaten them.
The second thing I would say is to call an attorney
To evict a tenant when they stop paying, you have to go through some specific steps to make sure that happens.
This is one of the great things about hiring a property manager, is they know the steps it takes to get them out. One of the things you need to do is get somebody like an attorney that knows how to evict a tenant that can take you through the exact proper steps.
Keep in mind, if you leave out a step, you navigate around a step, do a step incorrectly, the judge can literally make you start over with the eviction process.
Make Sure That You Get An Attorney
So, you want to make sure that you get an attorney, hire an attorney that understands the eviction process.
You can also hire a property manager at this point to basically take it over and help you with the eviction process.
And then, the last thing:
I’ve said it earlier that this is a business, okay, so you need to remain as objective as possible when you’re dealing with this tenant that’s not paying.
I know it’s very frustrating. I’ve personally had tenants that have not paid rent.
In fact, the first house that I bought, the tenant lived in it for six months and all of a sudden stop paying rent.
And I was on vacation when I was dealing with this issue. And it really just, really, really, really upset me.
Bottom line is that tenant owes you money, and that’s very frustrating because you made a deal and you’re living up to your piece of the deal and that tenant’s not living up to their piece of the deal.
So, literally first rental house I ever bought, the tenant stopped paying rent after six months.
So I’ve learned through the school of hard knocks. My name is Matthew Whitaker with gkhouses. Thanks so much for watching.
Matthew is the CEO of Evernest. He is a student of the book Good to Great and is passionate about building the best property management company on the planet (and maybe even the universe if Elon Musk will hurry up). You can usually find Matthew at the baseball field with his son, at a dance recital with his daughter, or at his favorite restaurant with his wife, when he’s not in the office. And if you can’t find him in any of those places, it probably means he’s traveling.
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