Desert Strawberry Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 Please be gentle. I'm struggling with this. We are trying to buy a home with acreage. We don't have a lot of money, so our options are extremely limited. Many of the properties we are looking at have renters already living in them. We need a place to live. If we bought one, we'd have to kick the renters out. I don't feel good about this. These are largely foreclosures or something like it. The house we're in now (renting from my cousin) was one of these type of situations. The bank foreclosed and kicked the renter out before my cousin bought the house, but still the neighbors have told me how nice she was and how long she was here and how quickly she had to leave, and her grown daughter was in it somehow, and it was just a bad situation. Totally out of my hands and nothing to do with us, but still I feel badly about it. Some of the renters are elderly and all of these properties are CHEAP. Like it would be really hard to find something this cheap. I just feel so awful about turning someone out of their home. At the same time, my children need a home of their own. This house is a loan. We can't stay here much longer. Help me be ok with this. Or something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maize Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 A renter having to leave is never the fault of the person buying the house, if you do not buy it someone else will eventually. The only person who has much control here is the one who decides to sell, and in a foreclosure they have lost that control. 40 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corraleno Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 I would feel badly about it, too, but the fact is that if you don't buy it someone else will, and the renters will be out anyway. You can try to be kind and helpful to the renters, especially if they are elderly, whereas if some real estate flippers buy the house they may be less kind/helpful/flexible. So even if they have to move, the renters may be better off with you as buyers. 10 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luuknam Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 If you can afford to, you can give them a bit more notice wrt when to leave the property than the minimum legally required, and/or give them a small allowance for moving expenses. That might make your conscience feel better. But yeah, if you're renting, you know you can be kicked out any time, especially when the house is on the market. 9 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JudoMom Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 You shouldn't take on someone else's guilt. If, indeed, the former tenant of the home you're in now had to leave in a rush, that is on the original homeowner. They knew their house was being foreclosed on and they should have told the renter. I know someone who was renting a home that ended up being foreclosed on and she had at least 5 months warning that she would have to leave. You aren't turning someone out of their home. The people who failed to pay the mortgage, causing the foreclosure, are the ones who are turning the renters out. Someone will purchase these homes from the bank, so while it is a sad situation, you have nothing to feel guilty about. 12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Innisfree Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 The houses are already in foreclosure, right? So, chances are very good that someone will be evicting those tenants, whether it is you or not. Will you have the flexibility to give them some time to make new arrangements? 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cinder Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 :grouphug: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Southern Ivy Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 As a current renter, I live with the knowledge that at any point, my landlord can sell the house, can decide that they don't want us there anymore at the end of our lease, can be foreclosed and we suddenly lose our home. It's the insecurity of not owning your own home. I understand the emotions behind not wanting to "kick them out", but it is the nature of the beast, honestly. Before we moved to this area, we had 2 homes with renters, we had to have them move so we could sell the houses. I felt horrible, like we were putting them on the streets. But we gave them plenty of notice. The rest was up to them. It would be nice if you could give them notice that you are buying and will be moving in, just so they can have time to gather another rent deposit and have time to pack. 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Southern Ivy Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 Some of the renters are elderly and all of these properties are CHEAP. Like it would be really hard to find something this cheap. I just feel so awful about turning someone out of their home. Coming back to say, this part would tear my heart out. I completely understand where you are coming from. :grouphug: 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Desert Strawberry Posted September 16, 2015 Author Share Posted September 16, 2015 We could give some notice. but that really depends how soon my cousin needs us out of here. This house is a flip, but he hasn't gotten to it yet. Eventually he will need to get in here to do the work. He isn't pressuring us at all, but i still know that at some point we will either have to buy this house from him or move along. We can't afford this house, so that's not an option. We really have no extra $$ for a moving allowance. I mean, really none. We have never rented a house before. It's different from renting an apartment. I guess I understand that you know you may not be able to stay. Looks like I need to go look at some properties. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anne in CA Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 If I were renting a home that had been foreclosed I would be well aware I would have to move. There is such a thing as being sympathetic, to people in a really bad spot, but anyone living in a forclosed house knows they may have to move, they know when the bank auction will be, they know they should be getting ready to move, it is not like you are a Charles Dickens villan, you are taking care of your family and have no reason to feel bad. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Desert Strawberry Posted September 16, 2015 Author Share Posted September 16, 2015 Coming back to say, this part would tear my heart out. I completely understand where you are coming from. :grouphug: Yes, if it were a high rent property like the one we're in now, I would feel less bad. But I know what it's like to struggle to pay the rent and know that there is nothing cheaper than where you already are. But at least when we were in that situation, the house was ours. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amira Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 Agreeing that this is a risk that a renter takes on. We've rented nearly all of our married lives and while I'd be annoyed about having to move if the house sold before the lease ended, the person I'd be annoyed with is the original landlord who didn't keep up on the house payments when I was paying my rent. The new owner isn't doing anything morally or ethically wrong at all by moving into a house they own. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mergath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 OP, you should look into the laws in your area. If I remember correctly, even after buying a house you may not be able to kick out a tenant who is in the middle of a year lease. Laws vary between states, of course, but you should look into that further so you don't end up buying a house you can't live in for eight months or something. 13 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vonfirmath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 We could give some notice. but that really depends how soon my cousin needs us out of here. This house is a flip, but he hasn't gotten to it yet. Eventually he will need to get in here to do the work. He isn't pressuring us at all, but i still know that at some point we will either have to buy this house from him or move along. We can't afford this house, so that's not an option. We really have no extra $$ for a moving allowance. I mean, really none. We have never rented a house before. It's different from renting an apartment. I guess I understand that you know you may not be able to stay. Looks like I need to go look at some properties. Yeah. The house we were renting when DD was born, we had decided to stay another year then find a different place to move into. Mid-July (3 weeks before her due date) we were given notice they had decided to sell the house and wanted us out by the end of August. YIKES! we got busy and moved out 7 days after she was born. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aelwydd Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 OP, you should look into the laws in your area. If I remember correctly, even after buying a house you may not be able to kick out a tenant who is in the middle of a year lease. Laws vary between states, of course, but you should look into that further so you don't end up buying a house you can't live in for eight months or something. Yes, this was my understanding as well. We just signed a lease on a house in MN. As far as I understand, even if the owner sold the house, the terms of the lease contract are still binding. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carol in Cal. Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 OP, you should look into the laws in your area. If I remember correctly, even after buying a house you may not be able to kick out a tenant who is in the middle of a year lease. Laws vary between states, of course, but you should look into that further so you don't end up buying a house you can't live in for eight months or something. This is the case in CA. I know someone who purchased a home. DURING ESCROW the sellers signed a 6 month lease with a new tenant, and the lease was binding on the purchaser. She had to sue the seller for damages, which was a real pain. And she couldn't move in until the lease was up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mergath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 Yeah. The house we were renting when DD was born, we had decided to stay another year then find a different place to move into. Mid-July (3 weeks before her due date) we were given notice they had decided to sell the house and wanted us out by the end of August. YIKES! we got busy and moved out 7 days after she was born. If you had a lease, it's likely they kicked you out illegally. :( Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mergath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 This is the case in CA. I know someone who purchased a home. DURING ESCROW the sellers signed a 6 month lease with a new tenant, and the lease was binding on the purchaser. She had to sue the seller for damages, which was a real pain. And she couldn't move in until the lease was up. From what I'm seeing online, it is legal (though I'm not a lawyer so the OP will certainly want to double-check all this stuff) to buy out a tenant in order to break the lease early, but most tenants are going to want, at minimum, their full deposit, moving expenses, and a few months rent to allow them to find a new place with so little notice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carol in Cal. Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 You know, it's really, really hard on long time tenants to have to move when a home changes hands. All things being equal, if I were in your situation and I had two similar homes to consider, and one had short term occupants and the other had longterm ones, I would prefer the one with the short term ones and probably tilt my offer toward that one. As others have said, your not buying the home is not going to save the tenancy. But I encourage you to look for something you can do to help with senior housing or with low income housing locally in the future to mitigate this. It's kind of similar to the 'whether to homeschool' debates. I never found any argument against homeschooling convincing except the one that was along the lines of 'homeschooling removes the parents who are most likely to be effective, active volunteers from the public school parent pool'. So I didn't give up homeschooling because of that, but I DID feel an obligation to volunteer in in the public school system for a few years after I stopped homeschooling, to kind of make up for that. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carol in Cal. Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 From what I'm seeing online, it is legal (though I'm not a lawyer so the OP will certainly want to double-check all this stuff) to buy out a tenant in order to break the lease early, but most tenants are going to want, at minimum, their full deposit, moving expenses, and a few months rent to allow them to find a new place with so little notice. My understanding was that you could make such an offer, but that the tenant was not obligated to accept it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mergath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 My understanding was that you could make such an offer, but that the tenant was not obligated to accept it. Oh, absolutely. I wasn't saying they have to take a buyer up on it, just that it's the only legal way it might be possible to have a tenant leave early when they have a lease. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carol in Cal. Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 Oh, absolutely. I wasn't saying they have to take a buyer up on it, just that it's the only legal way it might be possible to have a tenant leave early when they have a lease. Actually, here in CA length terms in leases bind the landlord but don't bind the renter all that much. It's hard for a landlord to enforce the lease along the lines of 'you said you were going to stay for 6 months' except in college towns with huge summer vacancy rates. In order to enforce a term like that, the landlord has to be able to show that he was diligent in his efforts to rent out the place during the vacancy--advertising, showing it, etc. The burden of proof is on him, and it's hard to win such a case, plus victories are hard to enforce. That's why Nolo Press recommends to landlords to rent month to month. It's a weirdness of CA law, different from most other states. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Southern Ivy Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 That's why Nolo Press recommends to landlords to rent month to month. We actually rent from month to month. We had a one year lease that moved to month to month after the first year. We rent from a co-worker of my husband's. They moved to another town and didn't want to sell this house right now, so it worked out perfectly for us. I love the month to month freedom, but it also can be scary. We can always decide to move at the end of the month, but the flipside is that they have the right to have us move at the end of the month. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom22ns Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 We actually rent from month to month. We had a one year lease that moved to month to month after the first year. We rent from a co-worker of my husband's. They moved to another town and didn't want to sell this house right now, so it worked out perfectly for us. I love the month to month freedom, but it also can be scary. We can always decide to move at the end of the month, but the flipside is that they have the right to have us move at the end of the month. This is the way most leases work in our area. When we rented we loved the freedom of the month to month lease, but the idea that both parties could end it at will was a bit of extra stress. OP I have a good friend who recently went through having the house she was renting go into foreclosure. As soon as she knew, she began looking for a new rental. Do make sure that you can take possession of the house as soon as you would like, but don't be afraid of kicking the current renters out. I would feel guilty too, but they know they are probably going to have to move. It won't be better if someone else buys the place. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vonfirmath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 If you had a lease, it's likely they kicked you out illegally. :( We were on a month to month. They gave us more time than the contract required. I thought about begging for leniency/a bit more time due to the baby just being born and I THINK they would have given it. BUT. My parents were there for the birth and it was convenient to havetheir help for the move so we just did htat instead. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vonfirmath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 This is the case in CA. I know someone who purchased a home. DURING ESCROW the sellers signed a 6 month lease with a new tenant, and the lease was binding on the purchaser. She had to sue the seller for damages, which was a real pain. And she couldn't move in until the lease was up. I don't know if you can do this in a foreclosure situation. There were renters in our current house. We had written into the contract that the renters had to be completely out of the house before we took possession. We had no desire to be landlords for even 1 day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mergath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 I don't know if you can do this in a foreclosure situation. There were renters in our current house. We had written into the contract that the renters had to be completely out of the house before we took possession. We had no desire to be landlords for even 1 day. Since the expiration of the 2009 Protecting Tenants Foreclosure Act, different states have different laws about tenants in foreclosure situations, so the OP will have to refer to the relevant state law. If it's not a foreclosure property, odds are she'll be stuck with the tenants for a while if there is a lease. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Katy Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 We got kicked out of a rental due to a similar circumstance back before we bought. It ended up being a HUGE blessing, because we ended up in a house that was twice as nice for $50/month more. We never would have found the nicer place if we hadn't lost the rental house. Don't think of this as a renter's home. It's a house they rent, not someplace they plan on staying forever. People don't like change, but it's often good for us. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tsuga Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 We rent. She could sell this house out from under us at nearly a moment's notice. It's terrifying. But we would never blame her for doing so, nor would we consider a buyer at fault for anything. It's her house to sell. It's nice that you care but it is not your responsibility. Your obligation is to your own family and of course to follow the law, not to re-home renters. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mergath Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 We got kicked out of a rental due to a similar circumstance back before we bought. It ended up being a HUGE blessing, because we ended up in a house that was twice as nice for $50/month more. We never would have found the nicer place if we hadn't lost the rental house. Don't think of this as a renter's home. It's a house they rent, not someplace they plan on staying forever. People don't like change, but it's often good for us. I would like to point out that while the renters don't own the house, it most certainly is their home. I think it's perfectly ethical for the OP to ask the renters to leave when she's legally able to do so, but saying it's okay because it isn't their home anyway is wrong. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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