Quote:
Originally Posted by Dantilla
I had residential rentals for a long time. While I never had a squatter, I did have a handful of evictions.
I know Landlord/Tenant law very well. I play by the rules.
This means I win. Every time.
I win every time.
Might take a few weeks, but the end result is the same.
Get stupid and do something dumb, like take the door or cut utilities, and now you've lost.
Might take a few weeks, but soon you'll be handing over either a really big check, or the deed to the property to the squatters.
It's possible the squatters would leave quietly, but most likely they know the law is on their side.
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This.^^^
Someone who actually understands the law...on Pelican? Stop the presses.
I cringe at the thought of someone dumb enough to actually heed some of the "advice" given on these landlord/tenant threads that pop-up here like perennial flowers. There must be a dozen of them, all basically the same.
Certain aspects of L/T law can suck for landlords when they get a particularly evil tenant who knows how to manipulate the system. Landlords always win eviction cases here if they are legit and the LL follows the law, though. Always win. Unless they are stupid enough to break the law and get caught for it.
Squatters living rent-free are most definitely one of the nastiest things for an owner to deal with. Someone asked why squatters even have rights? It is because from a legal standpoint, almost anyone living in a structure is technically a tenant. It's just the way that L/T law is written and it's for everyone's protection. It can suck but the stories of evil, cockroach landlords outnumber squatter stories 100:1 around here. So there is that.
A guy I know bought a house for cheap in Highland Park a few years ago, that is a quickly gentrifying area just north of DTLA. It was dirt cheap because of one little catch; the previous owner had started his own religion/cult based around smoking weed, (Rasta lite), and granted a 100 year lease to the cult he'd formed. He sold the house to my acquaintance and took the $$ and bounced, leaving the other losers in the house for the next owner to deal with. It could not be a normal escrow because of this and once again, the buyer got a steal on it.
The buyer was asking me for advice, crying about the cost of a lawyer, etc. Said that the lawyer wanted a $5k retainer before doing anything. "$5k?," I asked..."do you have the $5k?" He did but didn't want to spend it. I asked if he had tried to deal w the squatters himself, he had not. I told him to go to the bank and get a couple grand out and go over and feel them out. No reason for hostility, ( I thought it would be counter-productive), just see if they would play ball. Explain to them nicely that you bought the house and want to move in, you realize that this would cause them to relocate and that you want to compensate them for this.
For less than $2k, (I think it was $1200), they all packed up their bongs and scampered away to the next place. Hella cheaper than the lawyer and more effective. If it hadn't worked, he would have had to move on to other tactics but every one of them would have been more expensive and taken longer. Sometimes pragmatism works out. "You can leave w $$ or leave w nothing...up to you," seems to work for landlords a lot.