I am in process of evicting tenant (I made a thread about her NSF zelle recently)


Eviction court date is next week. She has paid zero money to live there for 2 months b/c she kept bouncing checks... AC goes out yesterday.


Is there any legal trouble with me slow playing the AC repair until then. It is 8 days.

I provided portable AC units already.

Not a lawyer, but providing the portable unit sounds more than generous to me.
Maybe she will be motivated to leave faster without AC.

right or wrong I'd do the same thing

Heat you have to provide. A/C, you don't. You should have told her you need to get rent money to be able to pay for repairs to the A/C. She'd probably already be packing by now.

CS78 said:

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Heat you have to provide. A/C, you don't. You should have told her you need to get rent money to be able to pay for repairs to the A/C. She'd probably already be packing by now.

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no - she sent me a text saying that she was served for a different court date than i was given from court and from attorney i had file it.


i.e. she is trying to get me to miss the correct court date. crazy people!

So she gave you a later date? This lady is on top of her fraud game

You did the right thing but man it would be tempting to let her cook in that unit. I'm not sure I would have done that.

Oh and don't be surprised if you lose those AC units. They will be at the closest pawn shop if you want them back.

I was under the understanding that if the temperature was above something like 95F for a certain number of days you had to provide air conditioning?

Legally, you don't have to make any repairs if the tenant is delinquent in rent. Texas property code protections for tenants are only applicable if the tenant is not delinquent in rent. Not saying I recommend that, but there's nothing illegal about refusing to repair in these circumstances

Hupernikao said:

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Legally, you don't have to make any repairs if the tenant is delinquent in rent. Texas property code protections for tenants are only applicable if the tenant is not delinquent in rent. Not saying I recommend that, but there's nothing illegal about refusing to repair in these circumstances

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Perfect

Good to know.

Good luck OP!

Not to derail this thread but are portable units even required if the landlord is making an effort to repair the AC?

Running through this scenario with a set of good tenants and we did provide them portable units. AC went out Wednesday. Due to parts ordering and demand it won't get fixed until at least this Wednesday. AC unit showing 91 in the living room but with the portable units their bedrooms are relatively cool.


What's the bare minimum needed here as a landlord? The portable units just a courtesy right? Reading up it sounds like as long as a reasonable effort is made by the landlord then it is what it is.

Not sure the answer to your question, but if I'm a good tenant and my landlord thinks it's ok for me to live in a 91 degree house for 7 days because he's making some effort to fix the AC I will not be renewing my lease, at a minimum.

Also, why didn't the AC company provide them? Our AC went out a couple years ago and we were given a portable unit for our bedroom for the couple days it took to get the unit in and install it.

Yeah I wouldn't want to renew either.

The AC company is out of portable units.

This is the absolute worst time to have major issues and everyone is having them.

I'm not putting them up in a hotel or anything as long as the portable units can cool a couple room until Wednesday

We just went thru something similar. Our still under warranty Lennox unit lost it's compressor. Lennox didn't have any in stock - anywhere. Our dealer took one window unit over - that's all they had left - for the bedroom & we bought one & installed it in the living room. Our tenants were appreciative and patient. They said they understood & knew we were working on it. They paid July in advance while Mr. Schwack was over installing that unit.

Lennox found one, it was delivered last Friday & installed Saturday, but our tenants were without the whole house unit for over 2 HOT weeks while we tried our best to work with Lennox for a solution.

If they don't renew it will be OK - it's a great house & they are in under market right now anyway.

AgsMyDude said:

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Yeah I wouldn't want to renew either.

The AC company is out of portable units.

This is the absolute worst time to have major issues and everyone is having them.

I'm not putting them up in a hotel or anything as long as the portable units can cool a couple room until Wednesday

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Renew - lol - tenant has never paid anything in 10 weeks she has been there. She has committed check fraud and bounced a zelle payment...then she asked me to meet her at specific Chase banks around town and then texted that i went to the wrong bank and that is why she didnt pay me.

evestor1 said:

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AgsMyDude said:

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Yeah I wouldn't want to renew either.

The AC company is out of portable units.

This is the absolute worst time to have major issues and everyone is having them.

I'm not putting them up in a hotel or anything as long as the portable units can cool a couple room until Wednesday

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Renew - lol - tenant has never paid anything in 10 weeks she has been there. She has committed check fraud and bounced a zelle payment...then she asked me to meet her at specific Chase banks around town and then texted that i went to the wrong bank and that is why she didnt pay me.

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Oh sorry, I was talking about my current situation the answer was about that.

Your lady sounds wild

You should have some space heaters delivered.

What a nightmare. Did this lady pass a background check?

wessimo said:

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What a nightmare. Did this lady pass a background check?

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yes - she works for a regional apartment property manager as an operations manager... previously lived in a house she owned for 5 years.

Property manager? It all makes sense now. She know every trick in the book.

Yeahhh.... Good luck OP

SteveBott said:

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Property manager? It all makes sense now. She know every trick in the book.

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Can the OP rule out foul play? Purposely break the AC to get out of some kind of liability? A small nefarious mind in my head thought of that after this post.

I think Dallas is only city that has a AC requirement and I think it is 20 degrees below outside temp or something like that.

So i ended up winning the eviction...was pretty obvious. now i am waiting on the appeal.


i hired an attorney for the filing and they actually showed up to the court date as well (fortunate mistake.) she told me that the tenant will only be able to file an 'inability to pay' appeal and that she would have to put all missed rent (6k) in that account just to file.


anyone been through an appeal?

This all just sounds horrible to me. Sorry you are going thru it. Thanks for the update - will wait for the next one.

This has happened twice to my renters. Both times, I offered to put them in a hotel until fixed. I live by doing the right thing and how I would want to be treated. Living in 100 degree house is not humane.

evestor1 said:

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So i ended up winning the eviction...was pretty obvious. now i am waiting on the appeal.


i hired an attorney for the filing and they actually showed up to the court date as well (fortunate mistake.) she told me that the tenant will only be able to file an 'inability to pay' appeal and that she would have to put all missed rent (6k) in that account just to file.


anyone been through an appeal?

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Congrats on winning the eviction. You went above and beyond, though, when you provided her with portable a/c units. As previously noted, you don't have to repair if the tenant is behind on rent. The quickest way to catch up on rent is to have an a/c go out in the heat of summer.

I have nothing to add on an appeal. Good luck!