What do you do if your tenant breaches the contract and leaves the property before completing signed contact?

Question

My Tenant signed a 12 months contract. After completing only 7 months , she called me and said that she will be leaving the property before Christmas( 1 month notice). What action do i need to take?

Answer 1

Remind her (in writing!) that she will be responsible for the balance of the lease contract at least until you can find a suitable replacement tenant. Remind her that written notice of move-out is required by the lease and ask her to confirm her intent in writing. (She may well re-think her options here. If so, just continue collecting her rent as if nothing happened.)

Once she moves out, go through your normal inspection process and prepare your normal statement of charges for repairs and cleaning, if any. Don't send it to your tenant just yet though.

You do have an obligation to mitigate her liability to you by taking your normal actions to re-let the premises. You do NOT have to take the first tenant that comes along if they don't meet your usual criteria. And if you own multiple rentals you do NOT need to put that at the top of the list to re-let it quickly. Most courts will hold that 2 months is sufficient time to re-let a property but that may be shortened or lengthened by local conditions.

Once you do re-let the premises, add the charge for the time the unit was vacant to the outstanding charges for repairs and cleaning and send it to your former tenant along with any balance from her security deposit. If there isn't enough deposit to cover all of the costs, include a bill for the balance.

One important point. If the lease or local laws require you to render the accounting for the security deposit within 30 days of move-out, don't miss that date as you could lose your right to collect for damages. If you haven't re-let the premesis by then the balance due to the former tenant will often be zero or even a negative balance. If it's a negative balance, include a bill. When you do re-let the premises, send the former tenant a bill for the rent that came due while it was vacant.

Follow your normal collection procedures if your tenant doesn't pay up promptly.

Last bit of advice; keep any communications with your former tenant business like. There's a chance that she won't be happy with the charges and may get upset. Keep your cool; it's just business as far as you're concerned.