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Problem Tenants - is There Any Way They Can Force Us to Keep Them on

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  • 08-02-2012, 07:44 PM
    stephenB
    Problem Tenants - is There Any Way They Can Force Us to Keep Them on
    My question involves landlord-tenant law in the State of: Florida.

    We have some problem tenants who we have had no end of issues with since they moved in, having had to remind them repeatedly to mow the lawns at the front of the house - on one particular occasion they let it get totally out of control and got the Home Owners Association riled up. Through their emails, they've also admitted they haven't lived up to their obligations for pest control and the house is now having issues with bugs. I'm not sure about the technicalities, but I think we would have had cause to initiated eviction proceedings on either occasion, which we haven't done.

    Cut a long story short, their lease is up at the end of the year, and we obviously have no interest in renewing it. These tenants are not going to go quietly into the sunset and will undoubtedly try and give us no end of grief until the day they leave, but we can live with that. What we're concerned about is that I'm sure they'll explore every avenue to try and force us to renew the lease and keep them on, because the bottom line is that they know the house is a good one and that they won't get the same kind of deal again. We've sunk a lot of money into this rental property, put in a ton of money to fix it up over and above what was simply required as a rental property, and basically wanted tenants in the house who would look after it and who we could obviously have a decent working relationship with, preferably long term. Clearly we made a mistake with this lot, want to start from scratch, and just get these tenants out as soon as the lease is up. As far as we understand Florida tenancy laws, the Fair Housing rules stipulate that we have to give every applicant fair consideration regardless of gender, race and so on - it doesn't mean they can stay on in perpetuity unless we have legal grounds not to renew the lease, right?
  • 08-02-2012, 08:21 PM
    STATcom
    Re: Problem Tenants - is There Any Way They Can Force Us to Keep Them on
    You're correct. Under Florida law, tenants aren't given automatically renewal of their leases following the end of their original term. You as the landlord can choose whether or not to renew their lease.

    Unfortunately, in your case, evicting a tenant can be difficult and time-consuming. Typically, even if you choose not to renew your tenant's lease, they can usually stay on the property while you initiate the eviction process. Under Florida law, this can take up to 15 day or more.

    Fortunately, since their lease is almost up, the process should be faster since they wouldn't have a lease to fall back on.
  • 08-02-2012, 11:43 PM
    stephenB
    Re: Problem Tenants - is There Any Way They Can Force Us to Keep Them on
    Thank you for that, I appreciate the prompt response.

    Hopefully we don't have to initiate an eviction process before then, and I actually think they have an incentive to move out earlier as they'd have to pack and move right around Christmas/New Year. With appropriate notice, we've told them they're welcome to leave earlier without any problems from us regarding breaking the lease. We're just going to have to put up with some game-playing till them I suspect.

    My wife and I do believe at times that we're simply not cut out for this, as we try to treat tenants as human beings and do the best we can by them. What you get in return is so disillusioning at at times that you wonder why you even try.

    Thanks again.
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