State Specific Question About: CONNECTICUT (CT)

Due to damages caused by tenants which they promised to remedy prior to vacating the premises, I have lost one month of rental income. Under these circumstances, are these tenants responsible for the lost rental income?

if they gave proper notice and terminated the lease properly-- your going to bite the bullet for the vacant days. Thats one reason to have a minimum charges and fees schedule with pricing to help make up the difference.

A little more info for you. While I gave them 90 days written notice of nonrenewal, which they never retrieved from the post office, the tenants tried to get out of the lease one month early, two days before the ten-day grace period on paying rent for July was to expire. They presumed they could use the last month's rent I was holding for August to pay for July. When they realized they legally had to pay for July because of the lease agreement, they took the whole month of August to move out. Even though I offered to hire a contractor to do the work, they insisted that they would remedy all damages, but didn't and left the place in a shambles. The premises was never in even fair enough condition to show it. The few times I tried to, people walked in and left within 10 minutes. The realtor I retained to rent it for me refused to show it to anyone because it was in such a poor state. The tenants prevented me from making any repairs througout August, then left without returning the keys or contacting me. It took until September 16th to complete the repairs. Until that date, it was not possible to show it because of wet paint, oil on hardwood floors; things of that nature.

How long did they live there? How many days of lost rent are you talking about? 16?

You must expect a certain amount of downtime between tenants while you conduct repairs and advertise the unit. It is not fair to expect the unit be left in perfect condition, especially for long vacancies where there will be lots of normal wear and tear.

They lived there for one year and it's looking like it will not be rented until October, so 30 days lost rent.

I am a CT Landlord. I had a similar situation. I hired an atty. to get my past tenants out. I forfieted the entire deposit, and then wrote off the lost rent on my tax return, and the cost of my atty. I sent the letter to them that they woould not be recieving security back with the itemized lisdt of why. THis went out immediately, as there's a 30 day rule in CT. (if you are not familiar with it, call the STate of CT Security Deposit officer).

The tenants, skipped early on the lease, did damages. but I was able to get the rent late for the last month they were there. They were 25 days late.

I had the same problem when showing it because it looked messy I couldn't rent it with them there. But, still tried anyway.

Pretty much, if you got them out, you are doing good.

If they did excessive damages, you may have a case. Major damage is a criminal offense in CT.

Did you photograph the apt. and do a pre-walk through inspection when you leased it to them? I had photos of my rental of before they moved in.

Review your lease clauses to see if they allow for atty. fees.

I did not go after my tenants for the damages, I took the security and I had a partial loss of income. Just getting them out was worth it.

They will never get a reference from me for the 4 years they were here.

Let us know what types of damages.

How much of the rent did you get on the lease?

And, did you get a new tenant? I was able to get another tenant for some of the lease and it helped.