Hi,

I am a landlord for a condo in West palm beach, FL. My tenant is not paying the rent since January 1st, 2012. I told her orally about 2 weeks back to vacate the condo. I am trying to get in touch with her but unable to. She does'nt return my calls and also tried to go to the condo to talk to her, but she does'nt open the door.

About a week back when I called her regarding the rent, she said that if we want we can give her eviction notice. So I am very frustrated and not sure what to do at this point. Please advise. Thanks.

The solution for a non-paying tenant is the eviction process. The process is a formal one, and the different steps need to be completed correctly and in the right order. Check the website for your local county Clerk of Court - most have helpful information online and the forms you'd need to bring the suit against her.

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You need to follow your states guideliens for nonpaying tenant which thus far you have not. If your going to be a landlord then you need to be aware of the state laws as they apply to rentals. Verbal notification is not a valid means of notice.

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The eviction process in the state of Florida begins with giving the proper state mandated notice. For non-payment of rent, you will need to give your tenant a 3-Day Notice to Pay and the language on the notice is set by statute. If you live locally, you can hand the notice to the tenant, or post it to the door. It does not have to be served by a process server. If you are not local and want to mail it, you can do so, but must add an additional 5 business days to the deadline to pay to account for mailing time per court rules of civil procedure. To calculate the 3 day deadline, the date of service does not count nor do weekends and state holidays. Example, if you served the 3-day Notice on Monday 1/16/12, day 1 would begin on Tuesday 1/17/12 and the notice would expire on Thursday 1/19/12. The earliest you could file eviction would be Friday 1/20/12. If you mail the notice, you would add another 5 days excluding non-business days making the deadline 1/26/12 and able to file eviction on 1/27/12. Make sure you keep a copy of the 3-Day Notice as you will need it if/when you file eviction.

During the 3-day Notice period, if the tenant attempts to pay rent in full, you must accept it and cannot evict. If they attempt to pay a lesser amount than full rent owed, you have the option to reject the payment or accept the lesser amount. If you accept any amount, even if less than total rent owed, it voids your 3-Day Notice and if you want to evict on the remaining amount of rent due, you must re-serve the tenant with a new 3-Day Notice reflecting the updated amount of rent owed.

After the 3-Day Notice period expires and no rent being paid/accepted, you have the option to file eviction. An eviction action is started in the state of Florida by filing an eviction complaint with the County Court of jurisdiction. Typical non-contested evictions for possession only take around 3-5 weeks to complete depending on the court's case load. You can also sue the tenant for the back rent owed in conjunction with the eviction for possession. This is called a Count I & II eviction and is essentially two lawsuits wrapped up in one case. These typically take longer to complete as the defendants response deadline is longer for the monetary damages portion (Count II) and will usually add a couple weeks to the total timeline.

If you need a blank 3-Day Notice form, you can download one for free from our website.

Good luck.

http://throwemout.com

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ThrowEmOut.com

Have you browsed through the information in LawInfo's Free Legal Resource Center to learn more about your issue yet? See: http://www.lawinfo.com/consumer.html and http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/index.html. You can certainly try to speak to a lawyer to determine what legal options may be available. In the meantime, you may be able to learn more on your own. Search the "Free Legal Resources" tab, or browse the Consumer Resources. Good luck.