Tenant Disappeared - No contact and no rent for over a month

R

ronaldo

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I'm aware that a landlord cannot evict a tenant without going through the due process.

However, what happens where a tenant disappears leaving no contact information and rent is no longer being paid?

I have a friend who's renting a house for which the money is lodged to his bank account every month on the 14th.

Over Christmas, my friend noticed that the December payment wasn't made. It's a tenant of foreign nationality so, as the tenant wasn't in the property over Christmas, it was assumed that he was home for the holiday period.

It's now come to the point where the January payment hasn't been made and he still hasn't been able to contact the tenant. His phone is offline, he wasn't in the house on any occasion that my friend went there and the next door neighbor confirms that it's been a while since he's seen him.

At what point is my friend legally able to gain entry, change the locks and rent the house out to new tenants?
 
Your friend is being negligent in not having done so already.

I would think that his insurance cover has lapsed, as the house is unoccupied for over 30 days.
 
Change the locks now. Next time have your friend secure suitable deposits against breakages and non payment of rent.
 
If it was me, I'd contact local Garda station with my credentials and ask to be accompanied when I entered the property.
 
I'd love to be the duty garda on the desk in the local garda station. A landlord come in and informs me that he hasn't seen his tenant in a month or more important ceased to pay his rent. Could he have been murdered? Can you call the Murder Squad? Send a team to dust for prints? Can we have DNA analysis?

Get a Grip guys!
 
Just a quick update, the tenant has contacted the landlord upon returning to the property and seeing the notice the landlord put through the letterbox.

As suspected, he was at home on holidays. He has apologised and told the landlord that money is short so he can pay 2 weeks worth of rent every week from now until his arrears are cleared. He asked me for my advice which was that, if the tenant has no ability to repay quicker, his best option is to proceed with the tenants plan and be more proactive in the future.

I'm sure the advice above will be useful for him, or other landlords, in the future. Most of the online information appears to be related to the more common scenario of getting a tenant out of a property when they will not leave as opposed to cannot be contacted.
 
@Leper - in my experience local Garda are very helpful in these circumstances.

I would not enter a house, unsure of what I might find, without having someone with me; and as I've said in my experience local Garda are very helpful and would sooner take 30 mins of their day than have to deal with a situation in the aftermath.

And sadly, yes it is not unknown for landlords to find that their tenant has passed away.

Glad to hear this one is resolved.
 
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