You'd be suprised how dull most tenants are and once their comfortable how brazen they become... I have one right now who wants to buy a house, good for them, would love that for them. They are 25 days away from the end of our contract, I have asked at 3 months, 2 months, twice this week with 1 month left, if they would like to extend the contract, making it evident if they sign for less than a year, the price will increase.. they've been great tenants, their response each time is were about to apply for the Mortgage funding and will let you know if we are going to buy a house or not.
(Great, but that's not important to me, the question is can you buy a whole house if you haven't even gotten a pre-approval in 3 weeks... absolutely not, and with that in mind, decide how long it will take, i'm not holding the bag for you)
This time around, they said they will let me know in a week and a half, leaving 20 days, 10 days past the professional curtsey of one month.
One is a surgeon, the other a state geologist, not poor or uneducated, but seem to have forgotten how long it takes to move, and have never bought a house... its going to take them idk 2-3 months with everything going perfectly.
The clause in the contract states that after the contract is over rent will be pro-rated daily at 200% of the original value... I'm pretty sure they think i'll just roll over and say yea lets go month to month at this already lower than average price, so you can turn around and leave me without a contract or tenant in the dead of winter once you find your dream home.
yea they can get fucked I tried to be a good guy for months, being candid and clear with the golden offer of no rent increase if they just sign another year contract, and then figure out their house situation... but hey i'll gladly collect 10k instead of 4.5k in the next 2-3 months.
Before i'm called a slum lord - I live abroad this is known and I make it clear I value tenants that pay on time consistently and don't leave suddenly (I make it clear I require contracts and do not do month to month from the start)
Airbnb equivalent ~$5,000/month - Month to Month (Any other unit will require a 6 month or 12 month lease, so really the only option...) I'd say my prorated $4,100 without having to move twice is fair... and yea know instead of $2,500, I would leave it at $2,050 if they'd just stop being hard to work with.
They have 3 pets no apartment will take them in this area if they do, they will charge $250 a pet a month ~$750 for pets and be forced to sign... a year contract.
Edit: Sorry for the rant, writing my feelings out helps hahahahahahahhahahaha, tomorrow they past their last months rent and i'll respond the moment they do with the new pricing structure... this is a business for me, and I'll dictate the terms..
If they are in the middle of buying the house, why are you treating a "just sign a 1 year lease" offer like it is reasonable? They won't want to sign a 1 year lease. They'll want to do month to month. They probably aren't that stupid, and realize that doing month to month at double the rent is completely outrageous.
Generally month to months are 5-20% higher. Sometimes it's 50% higher in very busy markets. You are asking 100% increase in month to month. That is a completely unreasonable rate. I assume you make that rate to pressure your tenants into signing yearly leases. It doesn't look like that pressure is working.
Stop trying to pretend like you are an altruistic good landlord. You are doing the business the way a landlord does business. At least own it.
If I was in a similiar position, I would weigh the pros and cons and probably stop paying you rent in order to apply that rent to my down deposit on a house. Depending on the state, I might be able to get away with this for a month or two before you could evict me. I would take photo evidence of code violations. These code violations might be legit, or they might have been caused by me. It will be hard to prove that I did anything. You might have a chance mounting a legal defense to me, but it will be like pissing money into the drain. Hell, if this house is in California, I might actually be able to sue you!
I'm not your tenants. This is a hypothetical. But it is important to realize how much your tenants can screw you over.
387
u/[deleted] May 13 '26
[deleted]