Lease violations require your immediate attention. While you might want to evict a tenant right away for moving in an unauthorized pet or not paying rent, a consistent and intentional process for rectifying the situation might be better for you in the long term.
Good tenant relationships can eliminate the potential for lease violations and conflict. Screen your prospective residents well, and talk to former landlords who can tell you whether they ever had problems following the requirements of prior lease agreements.
Here’s what we, a professional Albuquerque property management, recommend you do when your Albuquerque tenant has violated the lease in some way.
Communicate with Your Tenants
Whether it’s late rent, an unauthorized pet, or a lot of noise in the middle of the night every weekend, your first step in addressing a lease violation is communicating with your tenant. We recommend that you put this communication in writing because it will be important to document every part of the process. Send a letter or an email that identifies the lease violation and provides steps to cure the issue. Always reference your lease agreement.
Good tenant relationships are important for this very reason. You want to be able to reach out to your residents with confidence, knowing that they will be willing to fix the problem. If it’s late rent, for example, they may simply need a few extra days to pay in which case you should set up a payment arrangement.
Understanding the Eviction Process
The next steps will depend on the specific lease violation. If it’s nonpayment of rent, you’ll have a different time period to work with than if it’s any other lease violation.
We never want to rush towards eviction. Your goal should be to avoid eviction by working this out with the tenant. However, sometimes tenants are uncooperative. And even if you are working on a payment arrangement or some other plan to bring your tenant into compliance with the lease, you want to be prepared and have the legal steps in place. Long evictions are expensive. Get the process started early.
To evict the tenant for a lease violation, you’ll have to terminate the rental agreement with a written notice. Different notices are needed depending on the reason for the eviction.
If the tenant has not paid rent, you’ll want to provide a Three Day Notice. This is an official document that informs the tenant that they have three days to pay rent in full, or the landlord will terminate the rental agreement. If the tenant does not pay rent by the end of the notice period, then the landlord can go to court and file an eviction lawsuit against the tenant.
If your tenant has violated the lease in some other way, you will provide a Seven Day Notice to Remedy. The notice must identify the lease violation and provide the tenant with seven days to fix the violation and come into lease compliance. If the tenant does not fix the violation in seven days, then the landlord can go to court and file an eviction lawsuit against the tenant.
Two things will help you avoid having to evict for lease violations: a strong screening process and professional Albuquerque property management. We would be happy to help you. Please contact us at Blue Door Realty.