When consider rent is past due for partial rent (Las Vegas: renter, eviction)

Rubyww · 01-07-2013, 11:20 AM

Hi,
I rented my place to 2 roommates. They are friends and are both on the lease agreement. One of them has sent in her Jan rent check already. The other one hasn't send in hers so we have only 1/2 of the rent now. We couldn't get hold of either of them so I am not sure if I should deposit the 1/2 of the rent since I heard somewhere that you shouldn't accept partial check.

If we deposit the 1/2 check, when is the date that the rent is considered past due and when is it legal to serve the 5 day pay or quit. We're still trying to get hold of tenants since this is holidays season and they're probably out of town.

Thanks so much for the help.

von949 · 01-07-2013, 11:32 AM

Are you sub-leasing?

Rubyww · 01-07-2013, 11:40 AM

No. We are not sub-leasing. We are the owners. We rented the place to the 2 friends who claimed that they were roommates in another place. It is a normal rental agreement with both of their names on it. Sorry if there is any confusion.

ecd3easy · 01-07-2013, 02:46 PM

Never EVER accept partial rent. Wait until next month and then serve the delinquent person with the pay or quit notice. Is the place in the City of Las Vegas CITY LIMITS or is it in Clark County?

Rubyww · 01-07-2013, 06:26 PM

The place is in the Clarke county. We don't accept partial rent but they just mail in the rents separately instead of combining them. We haven't deposited the 1/2 rent check yet so do we still have to wait until next month to serve both of them? In our lease agreement, we specify that we don't accept partial rent. However, they still keep mailing in the checks separately. I thought by not depositing the partial check, we are ok to serve if we want immediately. If i deposit the partial check which is 1/2 of the total rent, then we can serve after the 15th, when it is the due date for the remaining balance. Is this even right?

Packrat1 · 01-07-2013, 09:15 PM

I once had a renter who had a buddy move in with him. I did a background on the buddy and he was ok. The buddy paid the renter half the rent directly. I listed the primary renter as the one responsible to pay the rent and listed the buddy as an occupant. That way I only had one person to come after. It worked out ok but I wouldn't do it again. If the tenant's income is not strong enough to pay the rent you likely will have problems with the garbage, utilities ect. too. Remember if they don't pay the garbage, they will put a lien on your home and cloud the title.

If you do go the 5 day pay or quit, do it right away if you can legally, don't wait, they need to know you mean business. Just hire one of the places like NMI Inc (the Eviction Queen) I would also charge the late fees assuming you have built them into the lease and don't allow them to pay unless the late fees are included.

You might seriously consider following the landlord tenant laws and do the 30 days notice and move them out if this continually happens. The rental market is quite good right now if you have a good product.

I assume you are using a LVAR lease or something similar. You will need to give a copy of your lease to the court if you go through with the eviction so make sure you are following it to the letter and make sure there are no unforseen loopholes.

squishy506 · 01-07-2013, 10:50 PM

I've worked in property management for the past five years, four of which in Clark County. You can technically deposit half of the rent and still pursue them for the other half, but the reason it is recommended not to accept partial payments is because it takes longer to evict, and judges tend to rule in the favor of the tenant if you did accept some of the rent money.

If I were you I would hold the check you do have an send them a five day pay or quit notice for the other half. Let them know you will deposit the original check upon receipt of the second. And if they never send you the second amount, you can return the original or whatever you may decide. Since they mailed you the check, you never had a chance to hand it back to them and say, "sorry, I can't accept this." Tenants use that to their advantage.

My husband owns rental property out of state, and tenants mail him rent as well. Periodically, one of them will pretend like her check got lost in the mail. If the mailing stamp date on the second check does arrive, and it's dated after the 5th, you can keep that as evidence that rent was late, and charge late fees based on that.

Rubyww · 01-08-2013, 09:47 PM

Thanks for all the good advice. I didn't like this roommate arrangement as these two keep sending us 2 separate checks. Anyway, I finally got hold of the delinquent one. She was out of town visiting her family and forgot to send in the rent. She came back today and dropped off the rent check.

Thanks again.