As a property owner, it can be stressful to apprehend when a tenant’s negligence might put you in hot water. When they signed the lease, hopefully, your renter agreed to keep your Pleasanton rental home clean and properly maintained and to refrain from illegal activities. Not all tenants will carry out to the letter the terms in the lease and problem issues that originate on the property can briskly develop into greater complications for you.
Although you are not held accountable for the criminal operations your renter may carry out, if you find out that your rental home is being used to conduct business, and your owners’ association does not allow this activity, your neighbors could hold you accountable. The result of any legal action executed against you will seemingly bank on two things: how much you knew about the problem (and when), and whether or not you took steps to stop it.
How and When You Knew
In some cases, tenants are excellent at hiding shady activities from their landlords. Nevertheless, if you do detect something transpiring on your rental place, it is necessary to take the initiative straightaway to handle the problematic situation. In some regions, if your renter does something dangerous or illegal as a result of ongoing activities of which you were aware, you could be held liable in court. For instance, if you knew one of your tenants was using your rental home as a daycare and one of your renter’s or their clients hurt someone, themselves, or damaged personal property, the court could be more likely to hold you liable for any damages.
The Slippery Slope of “Should”
At times, the question of whether or not you “should” get a clue about a renter’s illicit activities may come about. To cite an instance, if you are aware your tenant is self-employed before you render them a lease, there is quite a certain confusion relating to whether or not that indicates that you should have understood they would be running that business in the rental apartment. Additionally, if your renter had been evicted for loud parties in the past, you may be held accountable since you should have checked with their previous landlord about it. Surely, if you’ve done due diligence and didn’t distinguish any fact of the previous trouble-making, that will improve your contingencies of avoiding liability.
Addressing the Problem
It is absolutely a great idea to take care of any problems a renter is causing as soon as you find out about them. Yet sometimes, a landowner has restrained capacity and know-how to rectify the issue entirely. If a tenant is creating a nuisance for the neighbors but hasn’t actually broken the terms of the lease, you can’t be held responsible for failing to evict them. In order to be liable, you also need the capability to absolutely take measures about the problem at hand. Of course, the other side of the coin is that so long as your lease clarifies that you don’t consent to boisterous parties or business events and you don’t take measures to correct if that happens, you can potentially be on the hook in a lawsuit.
In Conclusion
The specific terms and language used in the lease is an important first step toward holding your tenants accountable for any nuisance or illicit activities. Meanwhile, carrying out quick, and suitable actions is also seriously a good way to keep yourself from being sued by annoyed neighbors. Screening your renters thoroughly is an alternative important factor to safeguarding yourself from the unwanted legal issue, as is executing periodic house evaluations. At Real Property Management Masters, we accomplish all of this for our Pleasanton property owners – and more. Would you like to learn more? Please contact us online or by phone at 510-398-8704 for more information.
We are pledged to the letter and spirit of U.S. policy for the achievement of equal housing opportunity throughout the Nation. See Equal Housing Opportunity Statement for more information.
