These costs can occur if the vacancy at your unit is due to evicting a tenant or if the tenant otherwise owes you money, such as for having caused damage to the unit.
Eviction Costs- If the vacancy at your property occurs because you have to evict a tenant, you must factor in these additional costs. There will be court costs associated with the eviction, as well as costs to have a sheriff lock the tenant out of the unit. This cost will grow exponentially if you choose to hire an attorney to deal with the eviction proceedings. Depending on the circumstances, you may also have to factor in lost rent from nonpayment or money owed from damages to the unit or other breaches of the lease.
Security Deposit- If you have collected a security deposit from your tenant, you may be able to offset certain costs with this deposit. You usually have to return a tenant’s security deposit at the end of their lease agreement. However, if the tenant broke their lease, stopped paying rent or otherwise breached their lease agreement, you may be able to keep all or a portion of the tenant’s security deposit to cover these costs. The maximum amount you can collect from a tenant will vary based on your state’s laws, but usually will not be more than one or two months’ rent.
Sometimes the amount of the security deposit will not be enough to cover the money the tenant owes. In this case, you can try to sue the tenant in small claims court, but even if you are awarded the judgment against the tenant, it can be very difficult to collect this money.