I need some advice help. And urgently.
My tenant has not vacated my property which I am due to move in to. They were meant to be out today and have written a letter now requesting another 4-6 weeks!! We need to do renovations and move in and this problem is restricting the renovations we can do before moving in.
I had luckily already booked a tribunal hearing for this thursday as thse tenants seem to be trouble makers and I thought they may decide not to leave.
Any advice on people that have had to go to the tribunal before? Also, what is the ruling that has resulted with anyone who has had this expereience?
are you using a property manager out of interest?
yes. they have been pretty good. but that didn’t stop the tenants from staying!
hmmm – last time I had a trouble tenant all I did was threaten a PM to be appointed and they did a runner. Hopefully someone on here has some good advice. I woudl probably send some heavies around but I don’t know how favourably the courts would look at this if things got out of hand
what state do you live in?
Bruce
Mooloolaba, QldIn another life, many years ago I was a PM and visted the Tribunal on a handful of occassions.
It is fair to say that they pro-tenants. Even when the PM & owners have done the right thing and bent over backwards. Not sure if that has changed – that was about 10 years ago.
Were they provided with the correct notices?
Good luck and let us know how you go.James
Like any matter dealt with by any official body.. paperwork is paramount, if you have copies of all notices, lease documentation etc that you have in regards to this tenant and your dispute and you can show clearly that you have provided appropriate paperwork, notification, time etc in regards to your tenant, the better for you..
As was stated the tenant seems to have more rights than you, so you have to show how ‘fair’ you have been..
your PM should be more active in this situation, they’re not there just to take ‘easy-money’
have you spoken to the tenants yourself ??
good luck[^]
REDWING
“Money is a currency, like electricity and it requires momentum to make it Effective”
Go and talk to them, face to face.
Most people wilt when they see the other person is fair and nice and reasonable.
Cry, if you have to.
Bec the negotiator
>>Go and talk to them, face to face.<<
Absolutely wrong advice.
They have been given notice, there is a written agreement and they are totally disregarding their part of the bargain.
Go and talk to them to do what ?
Plead ?
Finish up in an argument (or worse) ?
Be threatened by them ?
Have, whatever was said, twisted in court ?
The tenant’s interpretation of “fair and nice and reasonable” is ‘to let them do what they want to do, never mind the written agreement’.
They are obviously unaware of the existence of the Tenants Register in which they will be noted as difficult people with the end result that they will find it very difficult to find alternative accommodation.
Do you, Bec, perhaps have a couple of spare rooms to put them up ?
Pisces
Well said Pisces – dont get into a confrontation with the tenants.
It is ridiculous that the tenants have more rights than the landlord. What ever happened to a legal and binding written contract being enforceable? The tribunal are obviously a bunch of communists.
the worst part of all this is that we have done all of the right things. I do have all paperwork etc and my property manager will defend us in that they have been bad tenants – have never once paid the rent on the date due, but I am getting married in 7 weeks and have renovations to do which require a lot of hours from our end – painting and have to pull out the current bathrooms and have them re-tiled. We wanted to have it all done before moving in, but this trouble probably means they will ruin it for us.
Another thing is these people have applied for properties through my current property manager and have being declined because the manager doesn’t want to deal with them anymore. so i am stuck with them.
I don’t think it will take much to bring me to tears in the tribunal the way things are going!
I guess the court sides with the weak. A certain amount of pity for the underdog isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
(You see Bec, I have a heart too).
Ultimately however the court will have to follow the law.
The main problem is that so many no-good tenants are exploiting the law (assisted by the free legal aid services and the state’s housing departments who are familiar with the law and utilise it to explain to the tenant how to drag things out unfairly).
Instead of the tenant expanding their energy and getting busy with finding alternative accomodation they are getting busy with thwarting the lessor, only delaying the inevitable.
Ultimately however it is ‘the system’ which is to be blamed for the tenant’s outlook and behaviour.
People are just not educated at school how to handle money, drugs, and health.
The government isn’t prepared to make the hard decisions like banning poker machines, banning health damaging substances like alcohol and tobacco and sugar despite the well known detrimental effects on one’s health.
O.K., forget about banning. What about educating the population ?
In this state (NSW) for example we have this miserable looking Carr as a leader. The government is physically and morally bankrupt. Everytime I go across the harbour bridge I get physically ill as I am reminded of his miserable looking face.
The government cannot even spare a little bit of money to erect proper signage on the harbour bridge despite the fact that the harbour bridge is a cashcow and surely paid for many times over by now.
Now if they cannot properly manage something like the harbour bridge which is producing a continuously flow of money how could we possibly expect them to cut the state’s income by clamping down on gambling, drugs and other type of exploitations of the public ?
The governments depend on the rake off from the poker machines and other type of gambling to survive and thus cannot (so they think) remove these things out of people lives so the population can no longer be exploited this way.
Pisces
People seem to forget that the government is only meant to be a custodian of our money and that they work for us and therefore we are their bosses. They have a form of arrogance that makes us think that they are in charge and that they will push us around and tell us what is important to us. This is totally wrong and Geoff Kennett found this out when people in Vic decided they had had enough of his arrogance. Maybe other Premiers also need a wake-up call. I also believe that the Libs need to be given a rest at Federal level now as they are also too arrogant. I am getting a little sick of Costello’s smug little smile when asked about things like taxes etc.
>>I also believe that the Libs need to be given a rest at Federal level now as they are also too arrogant.<<
I agree that it isn’t a bad idea for a government to get a wake up call every now and then so that they keep in mind that they are the public’s servants rather than being the lord of the manor.
But gee, Labor ? They really stuffed things up in the 70’s (and we still are suffering the consequences of that today), mainly I think because they had too much pressure rought upon them by the unions with their excessive demands.
From my point of view the Whitlam’s motley mob were an absolutely scourge for the country and whatever came after wasn’t much different.
Talking about arrogance, what about Paul Keating.
Housesonly, you said “People seem to forget etc”
Yes, I agree, people by and all are just too apathetic.
They seem to just accept meekly whatever gets dished out to them.How can one change that attitude ?
In NSW for example despite the bad management record
of Bob Carr hasn’t sofar stood much in his way of being re-elected.However if there is any truth at all in the saying “It isn’t that the Opposition wins an election so much as the government losing it” we may perhaps at last see a change brought about by the recent train debacles.
BTW [
] this thread has now somehow evolved into a political discussion. Perhaps not such a good idea.Pisces
Nats, I wonder whether the agent who placed the tenant in your property did bother to check the Tenant’s Register before they were given a lease.
Pisces
NATS12
Your predicament sounds rather similar to what I just went through.
I have an IP in WA which had been rented to the same people for 2 years. As I was considering selling I wanted to take a look first hand to see what needed doing and whether it could be done with house occupied.
The tenants lease agreement had expired and had now reverted to a periodic tenancy. The original agreement specified that 2 cats were allowed.
Having repainted, recarpeted and fixed the gardens only 2 years ago I thought the place would be pretty good. Upon arrival at the house I was greeted by 2 large dogs and one of them was so happy to see me it urinated on the patio. Well the place was a pigsty and the back yard looked like a motocross track, bare sandy tracks where once there was lawn and a sea of half chewed debris.
Anyway it was obvious the tenants had to go, I couldn’t work on the place with them there. As required 60 days notice was given which would have had them vacating on or before the 2nd of Feb. This was ideal as it coincided with my rostered weeks off from work, giving me until the end of Feb to spruce up the place.
Well come 2nd of Feb the tenants have gone nowhere as they can’t get another rental (why I wonder?). I have trades lined up ready to go. Tenants inform agent that they will be out by the 14th. I abuse manager who tells me that getting court order etc will take as long. Try to reschedule trades, fat chance.
Tenants finally out on 14th, I bust my behind in the summer heat fixing reticulation, digging up weeds, planting turf, ripping up carpet and jack hammering tiles. Run out of time and decide I actually want to spend time with children before returning offshore. Managed to snare a painter and tiler so place should be finished when I get home 24th March.
As for the “managing” agent well we will be having a full and frank discussion upon my return.
This isn’t the first time I have had tenants who leave at their leisure and it just makes you feel so powerless.
In your situation you did well to book the tribunal early so hopefully they will be ordered out in short time, a week after the hearing is typical here. Just hope they don’t get angry and wreck the joint.
Hope it turns out well.Regards
SMTM
SMTM, have had a similar problem as yourself recently.
(door smashed etc).If your garden area was disturbed (read ‘ruined’) I think they deserve to receive a bill for the damage.
If the tenant is working you will get compensated eventually even if you need to gop to court (which they in all likelyhood won’t be attending anyway).
It may be helpful by mentioning casually to the ex-tenant that if the matter were to go as far as reaching court the blemish on their credit file will be a BIG BIG problem for them.
If every lessor were to insist on their agent reporting bad tenants to the Tenant’s Register at least others wouldn’t be caught with incurring damage.
So ultimately it becomes a matter of the lessors helping each others to avoid scum.
I have heard of others charging a slightly higher rent and making a payment to the tenant at the end of a year provided the tenant has not breached the terms of the lease (a good motivation for them to pay the rent on time and also to look after the place in a better manner).
Pisces
This is a very difficult situation but from my experience you are stuck with them until they decide to go. Took 3 months last time it happened to me, Sorry. The bleeding hearts make the laws here in Vic no logic allowed. You could , if you were really desperate offer them some renumeration for moving. Offer to pay them once they are out and the house is cleaned up. Goes against the grain but your situation is more important than a few hundred bucks. Do all this through the agent DO NOT DO IT YOURSELF. The bleeding heart tribunal will not like it one bit. They will see it as coercion or something like that.
Dave
Why won’t the tenant leave, I am sure that this knowledge would help you find a win win solution to your problem. Sometimes we assume the worst and hope for the best in stead of looking for the best solution.
I suggest that if you haven’t already buy and listen to Steve & Daves Fast Track, they have a story on there about “Jammo” that you will find has a familiar ring to it.
Cheers
Leigh K[]Carve your own path and lead the way.
What I would like to know is why anyone pays for PMs if they are not capable of dealing with situations like this? I plan to invest overseas and if I had to take tenants over there to court without active assistance from the PM (ideally to stop the situation from occurring in the first place) I would be very unimpressed (and in major difficulty). What on earth do they do? Take 8% of your income to do two inspections a year?
Please tell me this is an example of an appalling PM and that the rest actually earn their keep.
] this thread has now somehow evolved into a political discussion. Perhaps not such a good idea.
]
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