What Happens If My Tenant Goes to Jail?
Step 3: Know Your Options
Once you understand how things look from your tenant’s perspective, you can decide how to proceed. You should be familiar with the local, state, and federal laws that apply here, so brush up on your knowledge before you make any moves.
Overall, these are some general options:
1: Continue the Lease As-Is
Yes, you can collect rent in jail. This is the easiest option if your tenant wants to retain their lease and can continue paying rent on time. It saves you from serving an eviction notice, going to court, removing their belongings, going through a turnover, and advertising the vacant unit. However, this tends only to work if multiple tenants and one or more of them continue living in the property.
2: Ask Tenant to Certify That Property Is Vacated or Abandoned
If your incarcerated tenant does not wish to continue their lease or has no other recourse, you can ask them to certify that they have officially vacated the rental.
This allows you to terminate the lease agreement mutually before the term ends. You’ll need to devise a plan for dealing with the tenant’s personal property. They’ll need to sign off here, too, and it’s best practice to have such a document notarized.
Next, the question: if someone goes to jail and leaves his or her belongings, what do I do with them?
Your first recourse is to ask the tenant for a contact to remove all their belongings from the unit. Ensure the tenant knows you’ll charge them for removing any abandoned property and cleaning the unit if their contact fails to do so properly. And, of course, be careful to follow all local laws when dealing with abandoned property.
Step 4: Pursue Legal Eviction for Non-Payment if No Other Routes Exist
If you’ve exhausted all other options and can’t reach a satisfactory agreement with your tenant, or if they quit paying rent, you may have to file for eviction. Nonpayment of rent constitutes a legal reason when a landlord can break a lease agreement.
As always, follow all applicable laws during this process. Otherwise, you’ll probably be responsible for the unit’s cleanout costs.
