How to get rid of a renter?

We have a renter that has caused so much trouble in our neighborhood that several of the neighbors who live around her (all owners of their homes) have their houses up for sale.
-Her daughter is believed responsible for nearly burning down their next door neighbors house because of having dropped a cigarette on his lawn. Over 10,000 dollars in damages. But while she was seen trying to put the fire out and then running from it. She is a minor (12) and no charges were brought.
-They have all kinds of visitors through the night, all playing loud music.
-The rental house itself was damaged in the fire.
-The daughter vandalizes, while never caught, she has been suspended several times and is home alone when packages have disappeared from neighbors around her.
-The mother has been seen drinking with underage teenaged boys.

While her immediate neighbors have been urged to call the police, they are loathe to do so, because they are afraid of retaliation from the mother and the thugs with whom she 'hangs' (her own words).

Our HOA Board seems bewildered. All of them are nice men who don't know how to react to neighbors who aren't nice, so they hem and haw and nothing gets done. Meanwhile more and more neighbors have their homes up for sale. Nine in a neighborhood of 106. But they are all close together so as I would have said had I seen a neighborhood like that 'what do they know that I don't WANT to know?'

HELP!
Duane

Why not hold the owner accountable? If it is too troublesome for the owner to keep that renter, they won't.

We had the same issue with a condo rental. Our police department has an anonymous tip line and an anonymous e-mail address. All the neighbors sent in DAILY tips about the illegal activities occuring in this unit. We all STRESSED how we too were afraid of retaliation. The bad neighbor got NUMEROUS visits from the police who very strongly warned them that if ANYTHING happened to neighbors or property that they would come after them. It took some time but it finally happened....they raided their unit in the middle of the night and arrested all three of them on felony drug charges. Don't give up. USE your local police department and make CERTAIN that the police inform the OWNER of that house of their every move!

Hi Duane:

You might encourage the Board to form a "Neighborhood Watch" program with the help of the local police/county sheriff's office, which may discourage the renters if they know they are going to be watched along with everybody else.

Use of the police is a great tool, but it only works if they are called. In the meantime, your board might want to notify the owner of the suspicious circumstances that have arisen, as well as to send violation letters on any violations that happen.

If the mother has been seen drinking with underage teen boys, there should be a report to the police and/or child protective services regarding such incidents.

If there are visitors all night, it's likely that there is a problem with either drugs, prostitution, or both, going on there.

Check your city or county code regarding noise violations - if there is loud music, whether by cars or out of the home, it's likely a violation.

Talk to your police and ask if they can sit in your neighborhood near this house when they need to do paperwork at night, or if detectives in unmarked vehicles could stop by from time to time during the night hours.

Find out if the owner uses a rental management company - if so, contact them as well.

Best of luck!

JPM

Good luck meddling with a contract between the owner and renter. There is no legal right to force the tenant to pay the owner's assessment. What is it that isn't understood about an HOA's contract - which is with the owner only? All legal rights are already on the side of the HOA to proceed with collection of unpaid assessments, and to enforce existing regulations - instead of looking around for the easy way out. It is quite simple: Deal with the owner, always, as Walmart would say. Harold

Harold and Melissa - We're not meddling with the contract between the owner and the renter. It's true that no one can force the renter to pay the HOA assesment arrearages, but given that they might be losing parking and pool privileges, they may wish to volunteer to pay them. No one is forcing them to pay these fees.
We're only attempting to improve communication channels between the HOA, Rentera and Landlord; and make everyone accountable. Renters usually don't even get a chance to see the HOA docs and have no idea what the rules are. When you say that there is no legal right to force the tenant to pay the assessment, I really don't know what that means. If both parties agree to the lease addendum, then there is no problem. Listen to this story - Before we had the lease addendum in place, there were 4 liens filed for non-payment of assessments (hoa fees) on 4 different properties and since the bylaws state that their privileges for parking, pool etc, can be revoked if they are more than 60 days in arrears, we sent a notice to the owner, cc'd the tenant on the one rental property and informed them that we were revoking these privileges. The renter called and asked if he could pay the back assessments. He volunteered to pay the arrearages to the HOA. I was very surprised by this and I would think that if I were the tenant, that I could probably just send the landlord a letter and advise them that these payments will be deducted from the rent. I don't think that any landlord is going to take their tenant to court on this one. I really tend to object to your subjective comment where you say that this is "taking the easy way out". We have dealt with the absentee owners for last 3 years and they could care less about what their tenants does along as they don't destroy the owner's property. B.T.W - This lease addendum was written by our HOA Attorney who specializes in this filed and I think if you polled some of sponsors on this site, you would probably find that the lease addendum is not that uncommon.

I don't believe the association can compel anyone to come to a meeting. Suppose the owner is out of state or overseas? And the tenant has no official relationship with the association.

The association has a relationship with the owner and can hold the owner responsible for the tenant's actions in regards to the covenants and any other "rules". It's then up to the owner to convince the tenant to abide by the covenants and rules. This may place the owner in a difficult situation because he cannot "fine" the tenants and the law may prevent him from evicting them. As an association, this is none of our concern.

As for the actions of the child and the mother, it makes no difference if they are tennants or owners and they could just as easily be owners. Criminal behavior is criminal behavior. The suggestions to call the police on every incident are good suggestions. And if visible criminal behavior is observed, video taping it will back up the calls to the police.

Duane, I hope it all works out and the bad people are forced to move, but what could be done if they were owners, not renters?

In many cases, renters have legal protections that make it difficult to evict them. It's a shame, but true.

I feel your pain, this is our retirement home also, and while we don't have issues as bad as yours, we do have several homeowners who seem to feel that the covenants do not apply to them. We also have several families that, wile nice people, just don't know how to live in a nice neighborhood. Toys left all over the yard, trash cans left out, cars parked on the lawn, etc.

We also have several homes for sale, but the good news is that the neighborhood HOA troublemakers (the ones that disrupt the meetings and try to stir up the membership) have their home up for sale.