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Tell Tale Signs Of Drug Use By Tenants

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Three Tips To Tell If Tenants Are Using Drugs in Your Property

I was busy cleaning up a room in one of my weekly furnished rental properties the other day and guess what I found under the mattress? This was a sure sign there was some drug use by tenants going on.

drug use by tenants

Hopefully most of you don’t recognize this, but it’s a crack pipe. This one is a rather obvious tell-tale sign of drug use by a tenant, so I’ll give you some more subtle ones.

Missing aerators on your taps. The aerators are the little caps that go over the end of your taps in the kitchen and bathroom and have the little screens on them.

They screw on and rarely ever just fall off. So why do tenants remove them? The screens work great as filters for makeshift crack pipes.

During a property inspection do you see lots of steel wool around, you know the kind used for scrubbing pots? Maybe they just like scrubbing, but it apparently also makes great filters as well and might be a sign of potential trouble!

Are you missing door stops and cannot figure out where they go? Well when used with steel wool, they make great makeshift crack pipes. It is simply amazing how many different ways drug users can come up with to take advantage of their surroundings to get their high.

Disposing of Drug Paraphernalia

As you can tell I have obviously been hanging out with the wrong people who have been kind enough to share this with me and now I can pass it on to you. There are likely dozens of other signs, but these are ones I have noticed time and time again.

So phase two, if you do happen to find pipes, drugs, needles or any other drug paraphernalia, what do you do with them? Well, you have a couple of options. If you can safely handle them, you can drop them off at most fire stations or police stations.

If it is something like needles though, you can often contact the local firehall and they will come collect them, but it’s usually not on your schedule, so make sure you have time available (and this is not a 911 call!!!!). Even if it’s just a pipe there are health concerns, so always be cautious.

Hopefully you are doing your diligent screening in advance and never find out about the darker side of some tenants. If not, at least you are now armed with a little more knowledge!

Will That Be Cash Or Check?

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Make Your Life Easy

There’s nothing like taking the tenants rent checks into the bank on the 1st of the month and depositing a bunch of money. Unless you’ve made it hard on yourself that is.

Which leads me to the big question, “How do tenants pay you for their rent?”

Hopefully you have set yourself up with a batch of postdated checks to match the term of the lease. If you don’t already do this, you should consider starting too, it will make your life so much simpler. Of course, you have to confirm whether this is actually legal in your area.

Believe it or not, some pro-tenant regions have determined that landlords having post dated checks doesn’t work for the tenants. I’m not sure how this applies actually, but you need to find out for sure if you can apply this landlording tactic.

After all, it’s a pain to have to run around to your properties to collect rent on the first of the month. By having postdated checks from your tenants it will save you the time and frustration of doing just that and you can leisurely stroll into the bank and make your deposits.

Will That Be Cash or Check or…

Now sometimes, in some unique situations, tenants don’t have checking accounts, or their accounts change. A solution you can use to work around this if you do internet banking is email money transfers or Interac money payments.

It’s pretty simple, it’s quick and it saves you running around to collect. All they need is your email address and to set up a security question and answer for you to retrieve the money. With this you don’t even have to go to the bank!

There are a couple of caveats though. First, many Credit Union style banks aren’t currently set up to support this. So if you aren’t dealing with a major bank, you will want to confirm whether they have support this or it may be you are back to driving around to collect rent every month.

Second, there is typically a small fee for the sender, but that’s not your problem. It’s usually $1.50 or less, but it will depend on the tenants type of bank account which is beyond your control.

So there you go, a quick solution to get a payment from a tenant, or another way to take a deposit from a potential tenant! I currently have half a dozen tenants or more who pay this way every month.

Now it doesn’t matter if it’s raining or snowing, hot or cold, I can simply deposit rent into my account from anywhere I can access the internet!

A Rental Mortgage Doesn’t Have To Be Paid On The 1st

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But My Rental Mortgage is Due On the 1st!

Set your mortgage up to be paid on a day other than the firstIsn’t that right? Don’t you have to make your mortgage payment on the first and that’s why it’s so important to get the tenants rent check in immediately?

Well, did you know you can ask most lenders for the payment to be on a different date? You can even make it mid month if that takes extra stress off of you. Now be warned, the bank may want to charge you slightly more for the privilege of changing payment dates to something that works for you, but if you are a good customer, it might be negotiated away.

The biggest bonus for using this tactic is you will have a large window of notice if a tenant bounces a check and you have plenty of time to ensure your payments are covered. If for some reason you don’t already have a float to cover you in place that is.

Rent Is Due On The 1st! Because My Rental Mortgages Are Too!

This is actually another fallacy that most landlords fall into because they have to make rental mortgage payments on the 1st. Sure it’s easier for you as the landlord to track, but occasionally you will run into a tenant who is stuck in a weird payroll schedule and receives their check on the 5th or some other date.

If you have a tenant like this, you need to make a judgment call. If your mortgage payment date isn’t the first, you can be flexible and allow the tenant to make payments on an alternate date, decided by you and the tenant and then backed up in writing. The question is, how much extra work will this be?

Sure it can be a nice thing to do for a GREAT tenant, but now you have to make a second trip to the bank, which may not be much of a hassle. Unless you have multiple properties and now have to stop at the bank on the 1st, 3rd, 5th and 8th, just because you are so flexible with your tenants.

Understand Your Rental Mortgage Options

So before you commit yourself to some crazy banking schedule, determine whether it’s worth it, whether it’s a perk you can offer some people or whether you are just creating more work. Then again, if you changed all the days your mortgage are due to the 15th, maybe you would still only make one trip to the bank!

You Want HOW MUCH in Advance? Getting Deposits Early

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You Want it Early?

getting deposits early is important for your landlord successNot getting security or damage deposits and rent before new tenants move in is one of the most common problems I hear about, and it’s one of the most common pitfalls that new and even experienced landlords run into.

You’ve finally narrowed down your list of prospective tenants to the one that best fits your criteria.

All that’s left now is to get the appropriate security, and damage deposits along with first months (or last month’s depending on where you live and local rules) rent from them to move forward. Now depending on the applicable residential tenancy laws in your area, this can entail first month’s rent and a security deposit or possibly first and last month’s variation. Which ever the case, here is where the problems start.

You meet with the tenant to get the security deposit or first and last month’s rent for the property and they tell you they don’t have it all yet. The most common reasons?

Their previous landlord hasn’t returned their deposit to them yet or perhaps they are just waiting for their next check. Sorry, this is a definite warning sign in my eyes.

When it comes to security deposits, there is more than one security deposit in the world.

It’s not your problem to they don’t have their full deposit back from their previous property. Most importantly if it isn’t in your hands before the tenant moves in, they NEVER EVER should get in your property.

Same with first and last month’s rent where applicable. These payments are absolutely required to be in your possession before they take possession of your property. Failure to do this can be an expensive lesson.

If you’ve never heard this before it needs to be said, LOUDLY!  No one should ever get into your property until all the appropriate rent, deposits and payments are made up front and in cash. If you don’t receive the initial payments in cash, you shouldn’t release the keys!

This Tip About Getting Deposits Early Could Save You $1,000

If your local laws allow security or damage deposits, be careful how you write the receipt. Again this can vary from region to region, so you may want to check with the local landlord and tenant representation to confirm if this applies to you.

If the receipt says security deposit and they decide not to rent from you, you typically have to return the entire deposit. If however, you write it out as “deposit against first month’s rent”, it is no longer a security deposit and you have leverage, in this case their cash, if they back out.

There are always extenuating circumstances and ultimately the call is up to you. However, if a tenant commits to you, you turn away other potential renters and are left with a vacant property when they change their mind, you shouldn’t have to cover the entire costs of re-advertising, recontacting potential renters and even paying for new credit checks.

Often, you can keep the entire deposit, or only return a portion to offset your costs, if the laws in your local region allow this and it’s not referred to as a security deposit. So know your local rights!

Understand Local Rules Regarding Getting Deposits Early

Real Estate is a business, it’s ok to be nice, but you have to protect yourself and ensure you don’t get taken advantage of. Hope this saves you some future headaches!

Setting The Stage For Tenant Relationships

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Your Actions Dictate The Future

Just a quick potential revelation for you to think about when it comes to your tenant relationships. Think carefully about this next statement.

How you deal with your tenants when
issues arise sets the precedent for future interactions.

This applies to both sides of the interaction. My first example is how you react if the tenant has a problem like a broken appliance or problem with the property.

If you stall dealing with it, avoid getting back to the tenant, drag out the repairs or take shortcuts in dealing with the problem, the tenant will see this. That sets the precedent and in the future they believe you don’t care much about the property and by association them.

Be A Professional, Not An Amateur

Contrast this with reacting immediately, getting someone in to deal with it as quickly as possible, getting it resolved fast and keeping the tenant updated as to the progress or if there are delays. You have set the stage as someone who is professional, concerned about both the tenant and the property and you stand out from the crowd.

My second example will likely hit home to many of you who found me due to having to deal with problem tenants.

How you deal with excuses, missed payments and tenant issues sets a huge precedent. Telling tenants a late payment is ok sets a horrible precedent! Getting notice of a returned check from your bank and not immediately contacting the tenant is bad for your future!

Issues like these need to be addressed, penalized where necessary (and legal) and shown how they are an issue. Or they will reoccur!

To show you are serious, if this occurs with one of your tenants in the future, you need to write or type up a notice to the tenant explaining to them the issues. You don’t need to be a jerk, but you need to set the precedent that late, missed or NSF checks are unacceptable and if the practice continues you will take action.

Now sometimes these incidents just happen and they may be out of the tenants control, that’s why you shouldn’t be a jerk about it, but you have to set the precedent!

Good Tenant Relationships Help You

Long term, by establishing good tenant relationships you get rewarded with loyal long term tenants. And referrals. And less headaches.

Any of those bonuses are always great so setting yourself up for all three really can make your job as a landlord easier.

 

Here’s another article showing what happens when you have great tenant relationships, Thank You For Being Such an Awesome Landlord

Your Privacy Does Matter

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What’s Your Email?

Don’t worry this is rhetorical, but important and relates to your privacy.

You see, email can be a great way to stay in contact with tenants, send them updates and to get updates from them, but you really need to make sure the email address you use as a landlord is different than your normal email. For privacy reasons!

Be a Mystery And Protect Your Privacy

I’m probably a poor example of part of this, which I’ll explain in a moment, but here is what you need to know. Ideally you don’t want tenants to know where you live and to know as little of your personal life as possible. In fact, many sophisticated landlords don’t even tell the tenants they are the owners, they just tell them they manage it for the owners.

It moves you one step back, lets you still call the shots, it stops you from being the bad guy/girl if there is an issue or a rent increase. It’s “the owner” who is calling the shots, you’re just the manager, all while you protect your privacy a bit!

This brings me back to the email. If you advertise on some online platforms, they are nice enough to allow visitors to see your other ads as well. This is all tracked by the email address you sign up with, so if you use the same email for personal items and rental properties, tenants can potentially find out way to much about you.

I recently ran into this with a new landlord I was coaching. I checked out their ad and then followed their other ads to find out all the other items they were selling. This could lead to tenants getting your home phone number, your home address and basically just knowing too much about you.

As I mentioned, I’m not much of a mystery and as such I am a poor example of this in action. If you were to search my name you find thousands of references to me (I think they are all good!), but it’s because I am very active online, have multiple websites and hundreds of posts and articles online.

In this case, do as I say, please don’t do as I do!

Let’s Talk Facebook Privacy

Please please please don’t friend tenants on Facebook or any other Social Networks, there is simply to much opportunity for them to learn too much about you.

Hand Locks Cause Headaches – Only Use Deadbolts On Your Rentals Instead

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Why Deadbolts On Your Rentals Rock!

deadbolts on your rentalsDo you have deadbolts on your rentals? I’m sure you do.

How about your own home (this tip also applies at home!)? Most importantly, don’t tell me you have a locking handle, or worse yet that you have both?

If you have a locking handset, you need to make it a priority to remove it from your rental property, and also your home if it’s there, and make sure there’s only a deadbolt that locks on your rentals on both the front and back doors.

Why do this you might ask?

For one simple reason.

The only way you can lock yourself out of a property with a deadbolt is if you lose the key.

With a locking handle however that’s not the case. One slight miscalculation when going outside and suddenly a tenant can find themselves locked out of their property.

Suddenly this can become a bigger problem.

Now if this does happen, as a landlord you hope they can call their spouse to come unlock the door for them, but there are a couple other less happy outcomes that may also play out.

Sometimes they think they can break in on their own, usually resulting in damaged or broken doors or windows. Little surprises that you may not discover until they’re long gone and have moved on.

Other times, they may simply think of you as their personal door valet and end up calling you to unlock it.

In my mind neither is acceptable, although if you know there could be damage otherwise, guess who ends up driving over to save a tenant, yep you!

That’s one huge reason you need to remove any locking handsets on your rentals and why it’s also a good idea to do it on your personal residence as well.

Even Better, Deadbolts on Your Rentals And Lockboxes Outside

While sticking with deadbolts is the first step, there’s another strategy you can use to make your life easier.

It involves using lockboxes on all your properties!

Lockboxes come in many varieties, but the majority use a combination lock or keypad that you enter a code on allowing you to access the keys stored inside.

You’ve probably seen the ones Realtors use which may be a little more high tech (or in some cases lower tech depending on the Realtor), but we’ve had pretty good success with the simple Masterlock units.

They’re available either as units like the above image that lock onto a railing or a door handle or you can purchase other units that can be anchored directly onto a structure using screws.

By having a key for the property actually on the property with a secret combination code you not only have emergency access for a tenant situation, we also use this to allow trusted contractors in to save everyone’s time.

It works perfectly for allowing cleaners in between tenants, appliance repair people in to fix laundry or or appliances or even locked out tenants!

Of course you’ll want to change the code after giving it out to the tenant or to too many additional people, but this still saves you a ton of time and over the years it’s become a must have item for all of our properties.

Deadbolts won’t cost you much more than normal hand locks and all it takes is one trip to unlock a door to pay for itself.

Going High Tech

Times change and technology does as well.

When we started with our rental properties we used a master key setup where we had a locksmith specially prepare a bunch of locks for us so we had a single master key allowing us to unlock every door.

The tenants would get their own individual key that would only work on that lock, but my master key would work everywhere!

If I had to start over now however, I’d start with some of the smart locks that have become available.

These come in dozens of varieties, finishes and options, so you may want to do some homework. Oh and they also come at a variety of different price points which should also be a consideration.

Higher end units like this Schlage support Bluetooth allowing Smart phone users easy access. They can also be paired with additional hardware allowing homeowners (and landlords) to lock and unlock the doors from anywhere and even through services like Alexa or Google home if they like.

If your property is in a more upscale area features like this may be a great selling feature.

If however your property is less upscale you can look lower down the line to something that maybe isn’t so smart but still allows tenants to enter codes for access like this Kwikset.

It can be a bit of a rabbit hole, so you will want to do your homework and you will want a device from a reputable brand name.

If you end up doing this for a while (and landlording isn’t typically a short term hobby), having a brand name helps ensure parts and/or warranty will be available after the fact.

This may also mean you have to spend a few more dollars to get a quality unit, but with the wear and tear doors get on rental properties it save you time and money if you spend $150 every three or four years rather than $50 every year!

The bottom line is high tech can be good, just be smart about it, especially with your rentals!

One More Landlord Deadbolt Solution

One company that keeps on coming up in conversations in various landlord groups I belong to is Landlordlocks.com

This organization provides master keyed locks specifically for landlords. As I mentioned earlier I’ve personally been using a master key system since 2003 and don’t know how I could have lived with out it.

The challenge being you normally need a locksmith to set everything up for you, which can be expensive, and you might be left partially hanging if they retire (ask me how I know…).

Now I haven’t personally used LandlordLocks, but as I mentioned they are getting lots of great free press on multiple landlord forums so it might be worth checking out!