B & J wrote:
If the present undesirable tenant is "evicted" and before renting again, why
not consider setting up specific guide lines that the next tenant must sign
before being allowed to rent your property. We have friends who make their
living buying, repairing, and renting property, and I was totally amazed
what landlords are allowed by law to do

Yep, we're on it. (I wasn't actually asking for rental advice, but I
suppose some readers may find it useful.) We're actually drafting a new
set of lease requirements. In Wisconsin, anything that involves a debit
from the security deposit must be on a separate sheet called
"Non-Standard Rental Provisions". Surprisingly (to some), this can be
just about anything. Smoking? No dice. More than two unrelated persons?
Scram.

such as background checks of
previous rental history and employment records,

Yup. In our state as long as you disclose that you're doing it to the
applicant you can perform a full background check -- credit, criminal,
employment. Eviction history (and even late payment history) is now
something that can follow you from city to city, for better or worse (as
a landlord I have one view; as a former tenant I have another).

You'd be astonished, though, at the number of people who can't seem to
dig up their last *two* landlords for the application, or who rent from
relatives (heck, that describes me, technically).

number of people allowed to
occupy a specific property, damage deposits, upkeep of yard, and rent
payment time frame before eviction. One provision in their contract was that
no more than three people (a man, a woman, and one child) was allowed in a
specific rental home. If a second child was born, they were automatically
evicted. My mouth dropped a bit, but I was informed that as long as the same
rules were applied to all, they had no problems. Check the legal aspects of
all this in your area before proceeding.

The main thing to keep in mind is avoiding discriminating against a
protected class. That can vary from state to state, but at the federal
level includes all the obvious ones. (In our state, battered women are a
protected class, so we have to tread carefully. The real problems with
this tenant stem from the abusive boyfriend.) Section 8 tenants have to
deal with certain requirements such as number of square feet per person.

We actually have multiple Section 8 tenants and as a class they aren't a
problem. Most either came with references or moved onto Section 8 while
already renting. It's the strangers that get you -- and that's where a
month-to-month agreement is crucial. In this case, she got a 12-month
lease when she shouldn't have (in retrospect, but there's a family
rumble over this), and that's the crux of the problem. At other times
we've evicted drug dealers (boyfriends of tenant) using a simple 30-day
notice.

BTW, I was also informed that renters were given the opportunity to purchase
their rental homes if they desired, and almost half of the rented homes were
purchased when the tenants figured they could handle the house payments and
upkeep. This seemed to work as an incentive for keeping the property in good
shape.

Good point, and worth considering down the road, though it doesn't apply
in this case.

I'm not advocating any of the above ideas, but it's something to think
about.

Yep. The tree damage was from the kid, not the tenant, and I tend to
write that off as more of an accident than anything serious. If I hadn't
been so busy I could have put up a screen or moved the tree earlier.