Landlord Eviction Information
If there’s one thing you should know about the eviction process in San Antonio, it’s the fact that it’s not an easy to process to do an eviction. The legal work involved and all the legal forms causing confusion and questions, especially to someone not familiar with the process, is better left to an attorney so there are no mistakes. At the minimum, for you to evict your tenant out of the property you must be able to comply with certain laws and procedures that are declared by the California state statutes.
Inappropriate actions, like changing the locks of the place, preventing the tenant from entering the premises or forcefully taking their things out of the property, can land you to jail or make you pay for damages – no matter how justified you think your reasons are. To avoid unwittingly incriminating yourself, you better familiar yourself with the right legal actions for tenant eviction in San Antonio setting. Well, here are the important things that you have to know about the whole Texas eviction process.
- First, justify your eviction claim. It should be clear that the tenant broke a provision in your rental agreement, which, as often in this case, is failure to comply with the payment schedule or the conduct of criminal activities. Breaking of other tenant obligations, as stated in Texas Property Code statutes can also be grounds for eviction. You should note, however, that you must first exercise the proper legal procedure before serving an eviction notice. California statutes allow a seven-day notice for non-compliance cases outside of non-payment of rent, which are deemed ‘curable’ by law. ‘Curable’ here basically means that the tenant is still expected to address the issue properly without being lead to a downright eviction complaint.
- Serve the eviction notice in the right and proper legal manner, that is, as prescribed on eviction Texas laws. A legal eviction notice should be served in writing with the prescribed days before the eviction notice. This is the grace period notifying the tenant to vacate your property’s premises. Once the period limit is reached, the case now goes to the country court.
Serving the Eviction Notice
Serving an eviction notice, however, is a tricky thing. Bear in mind that there are different types of notices, depending on the grounds you used for eviction. The most common ones are the three-day notice (for the non-payment of rent) and the seven-day notice (for curable cases). Language and the manner that the notice was written can shoulder much of how your notice will be interpreted by the court. Heads up: not all notices ‘endorsed’ in the Internet will stand merit in court.
The proper manner of serving the notice too, such as whether to send it by mail, hand it personally to the tenant, or post it on the property’s door, requires special pondering. At this point, the role of an eviction attorney can’t be downplayed. Obviously, you would need professional help to come up with a well-written notice and to decide on other matters.
- Address the response/actions carried out by your tenant accordingly. Texas statutes allow your tenant to avoid eviction by paying the rental fees within the three-day notice, provided that they are in full amount. You are under no obligation to accept half-payments. Late fees can also be collected if you have explicitly included in your written rental agreement that you have a right to do so.
- Conduct the repossession of your property when the eviction is carried out. At the average, California eviction cases last for about three weeks, and a usual one week extension when a Writ is issued.
As is most often the case for legal matters, an eviction case will always be unique in its nature and type of legality involved. This is why most experts on property issues advised that you hire legal help at the very start of serving your eviction notice. An eviction attorney would be of tremendous help when making your way through the whole Texas eviction process.
First and foremost, since eviction is basically a lawsuit, you would need a lawyer (or a representative) to file the case for you in court. Second, you will surely need help in determining the proper actions for serving the notice and responding to your tenants’ actions towards the notice – in a lawful manner. Anyway, finding a law firm in San Diego that provides legal services for eviction cases is pretty easy nowadays, thanks to the Internet.
The Law Firm at Eviction San Antonio is here to assist you with your eviction process.