Renting out a property sounds, on paper, like a fairly straightforward arrangement. You need house; I have house. I want money, you have money. It is, in theory, one of the more civilised transactions available to two consenting adults. And then the tenant moves in, and somewhere between the lease signing and the first inspection, something goes profoundly, structurally, occasionally biologically wrong.
Reddit recently asked landlords to share their worst tenant experiences, and the thread is everything we need to know about human audacity behind closed doors. We have property damage that defies explanation. We have missing rent payments accompanied by excuses of genuinely impressive creativity. In these instances, the security deposit was never going to cover the trauma.
#61
My dad has a great horror story, he's been in the real estate business 30 odd years now but he claims this tops them all.
This was a time when he owned his own business so he had a lot riding on successes.
A client goes on holiday for 6 months, wants to lease/rent/whatever their property (full disclosure I barely know how it all works) anyway, the client has a clause that's like "will give 6 weeks notice before return want tenants gone from property by then"
Except when the tenant got this contract they'd just sorta... struck it out and signed it, gave it to the landlord who didn't think that was worth mentioning to my father.
Well the client gives notice that they're returning so 6 weeks etc, except the tenant refuses to budge. The landlord doesn't come to my father with this issue, in those 6 weeks he was lying to everyone. His boss, his client etc.
The client, and by extension my father, didn't find out he had no home to move back into until he was literally at the airport. It cost my father *thousands*.
This was a time when he owned his own business so he had a lot riding on successes.
A client goes on holiday for 6 months, wants to lease/rent/whatever their property (full disclosure I barely know how it all works) anyway, the client has a clause that's like "will give 6 weeks notice before return want tenants gone from property by then"
Except when the tenant got this contract they'd just sorta... struck it out and signed it, gave it to the landlord who didn't think that was worth mentioning to my father.
Well the client gives notice that they're returning so 6 weeks etc, except the tenant refuses to budge. The landlord doesn't come to my father with this issue, in those 6 weeks he was lying to everyone. His boss, his client etc.
The client, and by extension my father, didn't find out he had no home to move back into until he was literally at the airport. It cost my father *thousands*.
Report
10points
#62
Call from tenants the heater is not working. Outside conditions-2. I'm dressesd in minutes and fly out the door. Show up and renter is wearing shorts and tee shirt telling me it won't get warm. They didn't even have covering over the windows. FML.
Report
10points
#63
My mother rented out our apartment when we bought a house, I helped her clean it out when the tenants moved out. The tenant was unable to hold his bowels, and had to wear adult diapers. We knew this because we had known him for a while, but didn't even consider it being an issue. S****y diapers in the sink, in the furniture, hiding in the ceiling tiles. There were holes in the walls with s****y diapers shoved in them. Apparently he didn't know how to wash his hands either, since s**t was smeared everywhere. Total gut job. I will never, ever, own a rental.
Report
10points
#64
Not a real landlord but I did rent my house 1 time. I moved crossed country for work and was having trouble selling my house due to the market at the time, my wife's best friend told her about a lady she new that was down on her luck and was raising three kids on her own and needed a place to live. So we decided to let her rent it for 1/2 of what we paid mortgage wise. She paid the first month but never paid again, after 10 months of not paying I asked her to move out, and after a year I demanded it. She became extremely pissed that I would throw her out since she was a single mother who was having a ruff time but moved out non the less. When she moved out she put raw shrimp in the heating vents all through the house, poured bleach on the carpets of every room in, stole every appliance and even ripped the microwave out of the wall, on top of that her boyfriend cut part of the wall by the stairs out with a chainsaw to get furniture out without having to disassemble it. In total they did around $20k damage to the house which is a hard pill to swallow when I only make $50k and when I called the police I was told it was a domestic problem and there was nothing they could do. Needless to say I will never rent a house again.
Report
10points
#65
Tenants lived upstairs for 3 months, didn't pay the third month's rent, called in (as me) to cut off my utilities, reported me to Children's Division for child a***e... moved out leaving 18 bags of garbage & reported me to the fire department for the garbage hazard.
*just posted this to another similar question.
*just posted this to another similar question.
Report
10points
#66
Had a super Christian tenant once, I was fine with religion and everything but she'd always try to convert my friends and I at any given opportunity. I did go to her church to show that I am respectful of her. After some straight up sketch religious gathering she held at the house I was done with it. F**k that... Told her not to do those anymore, I was creeped out. She didn't stop. I am an a*****e by nature so I changed her toilet to have a cross at the bottom of it, so she'd have to s**t on it. Got rid of her that day. Btw she only wanted to pay half of the agreed rent amount, so there's also that.
Report
9points
#67
I owned a house and rented a room to a guy. This guy meet a girl on World of Warcraft and flew her out to stay at the house for a few weeks. No problem, I thought. A couple weeks never hurt anybody. But when a couple weeks turned into a couple months I was pissed off. She would sit downstairs and watch my television, while sitting on my recliner.
I finally had a conversation with the guy. I had no problem with her staying, but she needed to pay rent. He said something to the effect that she was still on vacation, why would he pay extra rent? And I said, "Bro, vacation ended when she started to DVR her shows."
He agreed to start paying rent, but they moved out a few months later.
I finally had a conversation with the guy. I had no problem with her staying, but she needed to pay rent. He said something to the effect that she was still on vacation, why would he pay extra rent? And I said, "Bro, vacation ended when she started to DVR her shows."
He agreed to start paying rent, but they moved out a few months later.
Report
9points
#68
Not a landlord but the tenants before us paid 2 weeks rent in the 9 months they were there.
They'd smashed 4 windows, put holes in several walls, and only had 1 light bulb working in the whole house(they had a 4 year old child too). There was dog urine and rat droppings in every room, and not just a little, f*****g heaps. We helped the landlord clean up (we know him and we got reduced rent) and found a syringe also. We started out quite angry while cleaning up all their mess, but it ended up being quite a sad thing to witness. The poor child.
The landlord never gave his previous tenants access to a large shed on the property because it had a lot of valuable things inside. A week before the tenants were evicted they went to rehab and their dogs went to a family member. Their "friends" found out about this and decided to rob the house and break in to the shed, stealing a good portion of the valuable contents such as engines, a go kart, ride on lawnmowers.
The police were called and have since caught the people who did it.
We've got the house looking really good now, my family and I have turned it in to a loving home.
They'd smashed 4 windows, put holes in several walls, and only had 1 light bulb working in the whole house(they had a 4 year old child too). There was dog urine and rat droppings in every room, and not just a little, f*****g heaps. We helped the landlord clean up (we know him and we got reduced rent) and found a syringe also. We started out quite angry while cleaning up all their mess, but it ended up being quite a sad thing to witness. The poor child.
The landlord never gave his previous tenants access to a large shed on the property because it had a lot of valuable things inside. A week before the tenants were evicted they went to rehab and their dogs went to a family member. Their "friends" found out about this and decided to rob the house and break in to the shed, stealing a good portion of the valuable contents such as engines, a go kart, ride on lawnmowers.
The police were called and have since caught the people who did it.
We've got the house looking really good now, my family and I have turned it in to a loving home.
Report
9points
#69
When I was a little kid, my parents bought a cheap house in a neighboring town and fixed it up to rent. Two young women moved in and were great. Just out of college, working entry-level and kind of getting by, no trouble. They called at 6pm on Christmas Eve because there was a spider.
My dad called back when we got home from church service and asked what they wanted him to do. They said they wanted him to k**l it. So he went out on Christmas Eve to k**l their spider. They seemed to think this was normal, like about on par with what you'd expect your landlord to do if your water pipes burst on Christmas Eve - the least he could do given the situation.
Not a horror story by any stretch, but it makes me laugh. He told me that I was not allowed to move out until I could k**l my own spiders, because f**k that.
My dad called back when we got home from church service and asked what they wanted him to do. They said they wanted him to k**l it. So he went out on Christmas Eve to k**l their spider. They seemed to think this was normal, like about on par with what you'd expect your landlord to do if your water pipes burst on Christmas Eve - the least he could do given the situation.
Not a horror story by any stretch, but it makes me laugh. He told me that I was not allowed to move out until I could k**l my own spiders, because f**k that.
Report
8points
#70
Had a guy rent a studio in a 300+ unit high rise I managed. He seemed only semi-creepy, but when his brother arrived from Canada for a week long visit I realized it definitely ran in the family.
The brother came out on their balcony at 6AM and starts screaming that he wants to blow up a large nearby tech company that semi-creep worked at. As if that wasn't bad enough, he was wearing an open bathrobe. Nothing else.
One of his neighbors thankfully called 911. We had SWAT onsite for about four hours evacuating the other residents, setting up snipers, the usual. Basically just another Monday.
The brother came out on their balcony at 6AM and starts screaming that he wants to blow up a large nearby tech company that semi-creep worked at. As if that wasn't bad enough, he was wearing an open bathrobe. Nothing else.
One of his neighbors thankfully called 911. We had SWAT onsite for about four hours evacuating the other residents, setting up snipers, the usual. Basically just another Monday.
Report
8points
#71
I had a tenant pour concrete down the drains. There was no repair possible. It was literally more cost-effective to demolish, salvage what we could and rebuild. It even got into the septic system and we had to settle with the city for damaging their infrastructure. Biggest nightmare ever. We sued the former tenants, but when you're suing a s*****g, best case scenario, you might get a 1990 Toyota Tercel.
Tenants are pretty decent as a whole, but if you have to evict, it's worth it to just offer them a couple hundred dollars cash to move out while you're there and can watch the whole process.
Tenants are pretty decent as a whole, but if you have to evict, it's worth it to just offer them a couple hundred dollars cash to move out while you're there and can watch the whole process.
Report
8points
#72
I posted this elsewhere (I think it was places you were banned). Anyway I was sent out my inspection notice from the real estate agent. The letter was pretty standard except for the fact it had the name and photo of the woman doing the inspection.
So I went on facebook and looked her up. Her profile was public so i thought it would be funny if I took pictures off her profile and put them in frames around the house. Turns out she didn't see the funny side and now i'm banned from going to the same office as the one she works at and someone else took over inspection duties.
now when i get notices they no longer have names or photos.
So I went on facebook and looked her up. Her profile was public so i thought it would be funny if I took pictures off her profile and put them in frames around the house. Turns out she didn't see the funny side and now i'm banned from going to the same office as the one she works at and someone else took over inspection duties.
now when i get notices they no longer have names or photos.
Report
6points
