tenant destroyed property, landlord rights??

[mary6265]

I live in Michigan and have a rental property in Detroit. I was conned by a mortgage person into purchasing this property with the understanding that her cousin would move into the home with the intention of purchasing it from me within the next two years. I signed for the property in August of 2005 and had no problems with the tenant. We have a lease agreement stating that she is to be responsible for taxes, insurance, the mortgage and any repairs that the property may need. I went along thinking that she was caring for the house as her home and left everything up to her to take care of. In May of 2006 did not receive a payment and could not get in contact with the tenant. I went to the home and was horrified by what I found. She had moved into her sister's home and left three dogs locked inside the house. After talking to the neighbors they explained to me what had been going on. First of all she had a dog which had two litters in the house and ended up with a total of 15 dogs living in a 680 sq foot home. A few months ago the basement flooded with sewage and in attempts to clean it up the woman pumped raw sewage down the driveway into the sewer. The neighbors had been patient with her but realized she had some type of mental problem. Due to the odor and fear of being mauled by her dogs they called the authorities and told them they thought there was a dead body in the home at which point the police came over, broke windows, threw in tear gas to calm the dogs and broke the door down. At that point they shot five of the dogs with rifles and took some of the others to animal control. I tried to work with the woman and she claimed to be cleaning up the house and coming up with money to hire a cleaning crew to clean up the basement. I continued coming by and seeing minimal clean up occurring. I had neighbors calling me constantly complaining of odor, fear of the dogs, and maintenance of the lawn and after writing the woman letters about cleaning up the house and removing the dogs to no avail I called animal control and had the dogs removed myself. They were obviously sick, there were piles of diarrhea everywhere and one of the dogs actually went all down the steps as he was being removed. I'm guessing sick from the odor and contamination from the sewers as well as their own mess. I previously was unable to get into the house to assess the damage because of them but now was able to see how bad it really was. In a second letter I warned the woman that I would have the locks changed and her belonging removed if she did not respond in two days. I received no response so I had the locks changed about a week later. I did not go through a legal eviction process due to the damage and because a lawyer I had contacted told me that he felt our lease agreement was not legally binding or valid. I want to file a suit against her in small claims court but I want to know what my rights are at this point. Plus I see there is probably no reason to file suit against someone who has no money. Secondly, I am afraid she is going to come to the house and try to break in and or destroy what's left of the home. Can I get some kind of order against her to stop her from doing this? Should I file an eviction with the city at this point? I know she moved out probably in early April and has been living with her sister which I know where she lives but keeping this house as a dog house. Please help!!

 

[acmb05]

I live in Michigan and have a rental property in Detroit. I was conned by a mortgage person into purchasing this property with the understanding that her cousin would move into the home with the intention of purchasing it from me within the next two years. I signed for the property in August of 2005 and had no problems with the tenant. We have a lease agreement stating that she is to be responsible for taxes, insurance, the mortgage and any repairs that the property may need. I went along thinking that she was caring for the house as her home and left everything up to her to take care of. In May of 2006 did not receive a payment and could not get in contact with the tenant. I went to the home and was horrified by what I found. She had moved into her sister's home and left three dogs locked inside the house. After talking to the neighbors they explained to me what had been going on. First of all she had a dog which had two litters in the house and ended up with a total of 15 dogs living in a 680 sq foot home. A few months ago the basement flooded with sewage and in attempts to clean it up the woman pumped raw sewage down the driveway into the sewer. The neighbors had been patient with her but realized she had some type of mental problem. Due to the odor and fear of being mauled by her dogs they called the authorities and told them they thought there was a dead body in the home at which point the police came over, broke windows, threw in tear gas to calm the dogs and broke the door down. At that point they shot five of the dogs with rifles and took some of the others to animal control. I tried to work with the woman and she claimed to be cleaning up the house and coming up with money to hire a cleaning crew to clean up the basement. I continued coming by and seeing minimal clean up occurring. I had neighbors calling me constantly complaining of odor, fear of the dogs, and maintenance of the lawn and after writing the woman letters about cleaning up the house and removing the dogs to no avail I called animal control and had the dogs removed myself. They were obviously sick, there were piles of diarrhea everywhere and one of the dogs actually went all down the steps as he was being removed. I'm guessing sick from the odor and contamination from the sewers as well as their own mess. I previously was unable to get into the house to assess the damage because of them but now was able to see how bad it really was. In a second letter I warned the woman that I would have the locks changed and her belonging removed if she did not respond in two days. I received no response so I had the locks changed about a week later. I did not go through a legal eviction process due to the damage and because a lawyer I had contacted told me that he felt our lease agreement was not legally binding or valid. I want to file a suit against her in small claims court but I want to know what my rights are at this point. Plus I see there is probably no reason to file suit against someone who has no money. Secondly, I am afraid she is going to come to the house and try to break in and or destroy what's left of the home. Can I get some kind of order against her to stop her from doing this? Should I file an eviction with the city at this point? I know she moved out probably in early April and has been living with her sister which I know where she lives but keeping this house as a dog house. Please help!!

She is alegal tenant and as such you DO have to go thru the normal eviction proceedings. She has a right at this point to get into the home if she needs or wants to. You changing the locks is an illegal eviction and as such she can actually sue you for that. Your lawyer gave you bad advice on that part. If he thought the contract was no good that automatically makes her a month to month tenant and she has to be legally evicted from that property.