In the hospital, not in the house, but this was my hoarder. I had her mostly under control by forcing her to hire a maid as a condition of renting my property. Which she did. So the place isn’t dirty, but my god the clutter. Not like piles of newspapers to the ceiling and stuff, no, this woman couldn’t stop buying stuff. And there are boxes and boxes of whateverthehell she bought everywhere. She rarely even took it out of the box frankly. No will, 1 distant relative in Indiana or somewhere. I am in AZ. And the rent’s due in 5 days.
So the relative will need to clean out the stuff or tell me to dispose of it or I don’t know. If the rent for Dec. is paid it’s her unit for a month. No lease, M2M tenancy. If not, then I feel like a shit heel for making an issue when her relative just died. But I need to get the unit ready to re-rent.
Any words of wisdom? Any other landlords go thru this?
If you haven’t worked through a similar situation before, get a lawyer familiar with estates and real estate to tell you what your options are. Real estate law tends to have a lot of ‘gotchas’, and if the distant relative doesn’t want to pay, you don’t want to give them grounds to sue you over the stuff in the house. I wouldn’t be surprised if you have to go through eviction proceedings to make it OK to get her stuff out of the house, and whether you have to trash it, have to save it, can keep/resell it, or whatever is going to change from state to state and town to town.
I agree with talk to the lawyer first, then the relative.
But as a suggestion there are people who will even pay for the job of cleaning out a building, check in Craigslist. Sounds like there may be a lot of Ebay, Craigslist, or flea market salable stuff for the person who wants to deal with it. Give the relative a share in the proceeds.
In my hobby there are lots of horror stories where a male collector dies and his wife or family throws out 100’ or 1000' worth of his “junk”
I’m sorry your tenant passed. I hope she was loved and cared for in this life. Hopefully you can resolve the situation soon and remember her with loving affection.
My first thought is that that she died, just dump the stuff and rerent the place, problem solved. But after giving it some more thought, I decided that if you don’t know what the law is, you might be best off taking a copy of the contract to your local housing authority and asking for help. It may be as simple as getting a copy of the death certificate and then being safe to dump the stuff. You may have to go the extra step and contact a family member and get (written*) consent to do so or you may be best off waiting until the day after the rent is to (and any grace period) and posting an eviction notice telling them that if they don’t pay in X (usually 60) days, you’ll empty the apartment, sell what you can to recover the rent, keep the security deposit and rerent it. And then in X days, do so.
But, like I said, I think your first step should be to contact your local housing authority. If you don’t have your own lawyer, this should be a good resource.
*If you send the a family member a letter, I’d suggest pre-writing it so all they have to do is include a copy of the death certificate and sign it. I’d mention that how bad it is, include some pictures and ask for permission to throw away and/or sell all the belongings.
As quickly re-read this, I do think you should contact, and get permission from someone in the family. This is something you really, really don’t want to be wrong here. Either because there were things they want to recover from the apartment or because you were mistaken about her being dead.
ETA, I know it’s a but crass, but at least she was M2M. That should sped things along. Even if you can’t track someone down, you should be able to evict her and empty the place it, what, 60 days, just for non-payment. You could do that even if she was still alive and living in the place.
If you can afford to own a rental property, you should be able to afford the stuff that goes with it.
I’m guessing it will start with whoever claimed the body, at least as a practical matter.
After you are legally free to dispose of the stuff, find out how estate assets are sold - locally, there are specialized liquidators who sell the stuff directly out of the home - 1 or 2 day sales, they retain a percentage.
Other places, a wholesaler bids on the entire lot and clears it out immediately.
You will (most likely) have a fiduciary duty to the estate to maximize the $ received from the sale.
Depending on what she bought, some NIB (New In Box) stuff is going to be quite valuable. Or it could be crap that is NIB.
See lawyer.
and see if you can’t find a quiet moment to mourn her passing.
Another possibility to consider is clearing the apartment out and putting everything in a storage unit. Yes, it’ll cost you the price of a storage unit but this way you can rent out the apartment while you’re straightening out the legalities of throwing out the property.
At minimum, you’ll need to follow whatever laws are in your state and the legalese in the lease for eviction after rent is not paid. I’d suggest calling the heir and making a plan together.
I fully understand your desire to get the place rented again, but I think, if it’s financially and morally feasible for you, that you give the relative a chance to help you out here. I’m not saying you should let it drag on for months, just contact him or her and see if you can work something out.
In most of these cases either a relative comes down and pulls out what is valuable or meaningful and leaves the rest or you are stuck with the whole mess. You should have at least a month’s security deposit so you can use that to get a dumpster and a local clean out crew. Hoarder or not she may have some valuable stuff in the unit so make sure the t’s are crossed and i’s dotted before you start whipping it into a dumpster.
If there is a relative tell them they need to get what they want out ASAP. Do not allow a floating time line. This is the kind of thing people will dither and delay over if given the opportunity.
It’s not going to work like that anywhere. The house was her residence, and she has a legal right to use of the residence up to the end of the lease, and the stuff was her property not the house owner’s. At her death everything passes to the estate until the estate is closed out, which means that the lease is still in force even if she’s dead, and ownership of the property can’t be changed without involving the executor of her estate or normal legal processes. There are ways for a landlord to get rid of abandonded stuff in a house, but it’s never going to be as simple as ‘tenant is dead, stuff is mine now’, and if he jumps the gun he’s not likely to get any slack, because the court is going to see him as a vulture stealing from a grieving family.
What they said about a lawyer. Then maybe contact the relative and offer to arrange an estate sale and split the proceeds. Depending on how big your community is, there should be three or four businesses that do all of the work arranging and executing a sale like that.
DO NOT enter the property, let alone dispose of the stuff, even when the lease expires, without a written authorization of the Executor or Executrix of the tenants estate. Contacting the attorney for the tenants estate and requesting written instructions for who can enter the property, who the items should be distributed to, and how you will be paid in full for rent due with the attorneys signature should be asked for as your first step.
Be wary of her relatives coming out of the woodwork demanding to be let in without this written authorization. If they press, simply tell them you have “been advised by legal counsel” to not do so without your tenants Estate attorney’s permission, and hang up.
I sympathize with the urgency of having the property ready for a new lease; I would check with local state rental laws to see what your options are if the above do not respond in a timely manner. You may even be able to charge removal of her items against her security deposit!
Just kicking the door down and selling off the piles of boxes and other items on the front yard could get you in a nasty lawsuit, and even legal penalties.
Where I live abandoned personal tenant property must be stored 60 days before any disposal is permitted. If you act before such time, you will be found responsible. (Former lamdlord)
Even on a month to month basis you should still be holding a months rent as security, so you’re not out any money for a while yet. But you need to begin the process, which the clock does not start on until you begin proceedings by giving notice to the estate, etc.
Of course it could be different where you are. Which is why you should consult a lawyer who knows about your jurisdiction. A mistake in this could prove expensive, educate yourself!
This is a business matter. So start thinking like a businessperson.
Start by trying to contact the relative. They may jump right into the process of launching an AZ probate. Meantime they can pay the rent from estate funds (if there are any.) You and they may agree it’s cheaper to move all her stuff into storage (at estate expense) so you can re-rent the residence versus them continuing to pay rent and use the residence as storage.
Once the stuff is out you’re no longer connected with the estate at all. So that’s your big goal: Get the stuff out all nice and legal. But soon.
If the relative is not jumping into this you should contact the probate court in the AZ county where the property is. They have a department commonly called “the public guardian” whose job is handling the estates of folks who die with nobody else to handle it. AZ may have a different name for it but they have the same function. The probate court staff is a good first free phone call to learn who to talk to next.
You can expect this will cost you a couple months’ lost rent and some hassle. Business is like that.
Your local bar association probably has a legal assistance clinic where you can get some basic advice for little or no cost. If the case gets complicated you’ll definitely need your own lawyer who’s experienced in local landlord/tenant law.
Last of all, 100% of her stuff belongs to her estate, not to you. Do what you can to document what’s in there now without disturbing it; cellphone video is useful. Beyond protecting *your *property from immediate further damage, such as cleaning up dirty dishes or food sitting out to prevent vermin, anything else you do inside there is legally risky. A grabby relative could make all sorts of accusations. They may be baseless accusations, but you’ll be stuck spending to fight them.
I am very sorry for the loss of income occasioned by the death of your tenant, whom you accepted (along with her money)’ knowing of her proclivities, and who agreed to and abided by the terms of your contract, which she fulfilled. I certainly hope you can turn this tragedy to your advantage, landlord.