Section 8 Tenants

 No more Section 8! Ever! I am through. I don't know about anyone else, but I have had it with Section 8 tenants and I will never accept one again. We bought a house in South Houston last year and did a really nice job remodeling it. The remodel was excellent and the house got new appliances, new carpet and a new paint job. During the time it was being worked on we ran an add on rentclicks.com (I highly recommend this site) and we received many inquires. The majority of the inquiries were from Hurricane Katrina victims and because we wanted to do our part we stated that we were open to them, as well as Section 8 tenants. After going through many of them we were contact by a woman who was assisting her handicapped boyfriend in finding a residence. We wanted to be good citizens so we worked with her and accepted him as a tenant. In addition to the normal aspects of getting the house ready for a new tenant we agreed to widen the bathroom doorway for him at our expense. Things went along fine for a while until she left him. That’s when the trouble began. Firstly, the property manager that we turned it over to figured out that he had never put the utilities in his own name, so we asked can i make a tenancy deposit claim. He was under the impression he didn't have to pay those either. He thought that the city was paying the rent and we were paying the utilities. Well, we informed him of this about three or four months ago and at that point the decided he didn’t want to live there anymore if everything wasn’t going to be free. So, he found a loophole. The hot water heater wasn’t raised off the ground and he reported to housing that we weren’t repairing it. He forget to tell housing that he kept standing the management company up when they came out to repair it. Since he reported it, housing stopped paying us and we had to start the eviction process. Unbelievable! This guy was living in a newly remodeled house for free and all he had to pay was utilities and that wasn’t good enough. So now we have another vacancy! Anyone out there have any good Section 8 stories that beat mine???

Derek wrote:
My parents had a Section 8 tenant in Petaluma, CA. Didn't have any issues with her until we wanted to sell the house. She probably stayed there over 20 years and the state paid 90% of the rent every month. She charged her kids rent and they paid the remainder cash every month. They were total white trash, but didn't trash the place. No holes in the wall or anything. I wouldn't make a sweeping generalization about Section 8 tenants. Also, Section 8 tenants can actually lose their Section 8 qualification if they trash the place or are evicted and that is always something you can hold over their heads. I feel your pain though - nobody likes a bad tenant and you're bound to run into one if you do this long enough.
-Derek

Keith wrote:
I'm sure there are some good ones out there. However, I am really trying to see the advantages or reasons I would ever want one again. If you do due diligence and you find a good, standard tenant they should take care of the property and pay the rent on time. In addition you, or the management company, deals directly with the tenant. I don't know about other areas, but dealing with the Houston Housing authority is a total nightmare according to the Management company I use. Its a beaucratic nightmare and it took us months to get paid initially. It seems with that type of hassle that there is no advantage to signing up a Section 8 tenant. Am I missing something? Some big advantage? I have only had two so this is a legitimate question.

Chip Ahlswede wrote:
There are some great benefits to Section 8 tennants.

1st, the group administering the Section 8 program will pay their portion every month on time, and most of the time through direct payment.

2nd, if there are any problems, even the slightest hint of a problem, Section 8 will back your removal of the tennant.

3rd, there is a huge waiting list for the program. Anytime you need to remove someone, you can be relatively sure you can fill the vacancy right away.

The key to it, and you touched on it, is background checks. Do your due dilligence ahead of time, and you will be fine. Keep apprised of what is going on in your properties, and you will be fine.

Be an uninformed absentee landlord, and you will get screwed. The same as with any rental situation.

Keith wrote:
Maybe the program is better run in California. Here in Texas you can't even reach anyone and so its difficult to get them to back you when you start having problems with the tenant. Now I have never dealt with them personally, as I have a property management company (I highly reccomend using one). According to the property management I use in Houston the housing people that administer it are terrible and they have stopped accepting Section 8 tenants entirely.

Allen wrote:
I had 10 tenants out of 20 that were section 8 at one time. I am down to two now because of all the crap you have to deal with. You can't reach anyone at the housing authority and they never return your call. I am through with section 8.

Dennis wrote:
I currently have a Section 8 from Harris County not the city. The tenant has been great, they pay on time, take care of the house, the county pays their portion. I've only had one inspection from the county on the house. It went well also