Landlord Question and Answer Forum

I have an upstairs downstairs rental unit. Upstairs tenant (61 yr old single female) has been there for 8 yrs. I have new tenants in downstairs (family of 4 with a special needs son) unit since this May. Downstairs tenant have placed complaints after complaints of upstairs tenant for being loud at night, slamming the door etc. I live out-of-state and have gotten multiple calls and texts from both parties -- he said she said! Downstairs tenants called the police-I spoke with the police and he couldn't understand what the issue was! Anyways - I'm tired of all this and think the downstairs tenants may need to go. They have mentioned that they will be looking to move. The big issue is that if they break the lease, technically they should not get their security deposit back. I now think that they are making a scapegoat out of the upstairs tenant so they can move and get the security deposit back! In the screening process there were some red flags that they had a law suit with the one landlord but they termed it that it was over discrimination of their children. At this point, should I just bite the bullet and have them move out and give back their security deposit? This behavior will continue to happen if my upstairs tenant moves out and I get someone new in there I'm afraid! Any suggestions would be great!!

Oh boy gather all of your paperwork and background check as well as any called or filed police reports. Get a lawyer ready and start the eviction process. You will be able to use the neighbor and police as witnesses to false complaints or demands. If you would rather just cut clean ties do a mutual termination of lease and take the loss. It may be the better way to do this in hopes that they just leave. Get another tenant as soon as possible.

Posted by Derrick D, PA on Thursday, July 30, 2015