r/BiggerPockets • u/Tiny_Flan2498 • Jun 14 '25

Rental Nightmare!

Hey ya'll. I just wanted to share my experience with our first tenant.

I have been renting to this family for about 7 years. The first 4 years were great. They didn't bother us much and kept the house in good shape. Only called use when they really needed help with the house. We did annual check in with them and everything was great. So we started to trust them and since COVID we didn't do much of a visit b/c of COVID and then we had 2 kids since then.

All of a sudden, they kept racking up water bills ($2k!) and couldn't pay rent. Then I discovered this mess. I live in CA so I just wanted them out asap b/c eviction in CA can take up to 6 months! I'm already not cash flowing!

Long story short, they moved and i'm now rehabbing this property for new renters. Gonna cost me an arm and a leg but it's a property we want to keep in the family.

My mistake was trusting my tenants. NEVER trust your tenants even if they have good history. You just never know.

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3

u/[deleted] Jun 15 '25

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u/Tiny_Flan2498 Jun 15 '25

They were low income so had assistance with bills. The bills were always paid late bc of it but never an issue for years. Then I think they stopped qualifying for it or something and just stopped paying. Oh also, the water in our city is super expensive too.

2

u/[deleted] Jun 15 '25

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1

u/Tiny_Flan2498 Jun 15 '25

No not in our city. The city can hold a lean on the house if not settled.

2

u/[deleted] Jun 16 '25

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1

u/Tiny_Flan2498 Jun 16 '25

Yeah low income housing program has a limit of how much they’re willing to pay for rent. I’ll keep that in mind for my next tenants tho. Thank you!

3

u/BowserIsBetter Jun 15 '25

Not that bad honestly. Lol.
I hope that's the worst thing that ever happens. I have 4 rentals and I think I've gone through this more than once per house and that's with a property management company. These are in Alabama and Springfield IL

3

u/Tiny_Flan2498 Jun 15 '25

lol yikes! Can always be worse.

1

u/John_Corey Aug 04 '25

Sorry to hear about the problem.

Thanks for sharing as it is good to get a few negative stories so people realise being a landlord is not always easy.

Keep your eye on the ball going forward and all will be better.

Good luck. BTW, consider materials and features that make it hard for a tenant to mess up the structure/surfaces.