What would you do if you had a tenant that has been furloughed because of the government shutdown call to tell you that they don't have the money to pay the rent?
Obviously the choice is up to you, you could deal with the tenant as you would any other person who worked for a civilian employer and was fired, laid off, or the business closed, or you could cut the furloughed federal employee a break.
After all this furloughed employee will soon be back to work and will likely be given back pay for all the furloughed days. It is not like a civilian situation, where they are just out the money, this is more a situation where the paycheck is being temporarily held hostage (if you will), through no fault of the tenant.
On the other hand, none of us are guaranteed that the job and income we have today will be there tomorrow, so the lack of any kind of emergency fund is a bit worrisome to say the least. Plus, the resident should have friends, family, church, a community organization, or someone else who can float a loan if they're trustworthy.
If the tenant has a good history of paying rent and is a top notch tenant I would consider some kind of very temporary payment plan and I guess if the rent payments didn't start rolling in then i would have gambled and lost. Government shutdowns haven't happened very often, the last one being in 1995 when President Clinton was in office so they are kind of extraordinary circumstances. So with a really good tenant I might be convinced to let my compassionate side lead rather then my business side. What would you do, would you cut the federal employee some slack, they are already feeling shoved aside as "nonessential employees"?
Dulcey is a member of Rentec Direct who provides Property Management Software, tenant ach payment processing, Rentec credit, criminal, and eviction screening for property managers and landlords.
Comments(2)