Storytime: Detroit Rentals: What Do Squatters and House Sitters Have To To With It?

If there is a vacant house in Detroit for any length of time, you better assume an unscrupulous neighbor notices and he is in that house that night stealing the furnace and hot water heater. And if there is a vacant house another risk is that a squatter will move themselves in.

We have a had a few squatter situations recently that have had some interesting conclusions.

We have a house that we renovated back in 2019. We have since sold our property management business so that house was managed by a couple of different property managers. The owner got fed up with a non-paying tenant who took full advantage of the COVID court backlogs. That tenant was finally evicted after a year of no rent. I was able to sell the house to a new owner but between owners the house got stripped. This time instead of just stealing the furnace and hot water heater, these thieves took out the new kitchen cabinets, bathroom vanity, and removed the security and steel doors.

How could this have been prevented? The property manager could have immediately removed the furnace and hot water heater right after the eviction. The owner could have had the property manager board up the house immediately, which doesn’t help when the crew goes there to clean it out. Or they could have paid for DAWGS doors, which also makes renovating it harder. Or they could have hired a house sitter. House sitters come with their own issues though. See my video here on how to secure a property. None of these methods are cure alls though. But the house was simply left vacant too long.

In the following video, I go into detail about each of these options.

This video I made also goes into ways to handle squatters together with another squatter story:

Here is another video I made about a house that had DAWGS doors on it but a person with a vendetta found another way to destroy the house. This is more unusual in Detroit to have someone go to this length though.

When it came to our attention that the doors were missing and nothing was being done, we immediately had the doors boarded up. Soon thereafter my husband came with his crew to assess the turnover project. They did notice a broken window on the main floor, but they assumed that happened when someone stole the furnace after the tenants vacated. My husband Pat and his crew were walking through the house and everything was fine until they got to the upstairs. Pat opened the door and felt heat which had to be from a space heater and he smelled cigarette smoke that was really fresh. Pat yelled up the stairs, “Homeowner here. Coming up. Announce yourself.” No one announced themselves.

It was pretty dangerous for Pat to go up there because it could have been anyone and he could have gotten hit over the top of the head on his way up those stairs. But that’s not what happened. He got up there only to find a scared little young WOMAN crying hysterically in fear.

Apparently, she is from Ohio and moved to Detroit to follow a boyfriend. She also got a job at The Dollar Tree. She ended up dumping the boyfriend and had nowhere to live. She saw that we had power in this house so she was able to break in a window before we boarded it and let herself in.

So what to do? My husband took compassion. We have a 23-year-old daughter who is now in California going to graduate school. She had a very trying time herself between places to live and she even threatened that she might have to sleep in her car, but we were able to get her a hotel for the interim. Apparently, this girl does not have that relationship with her parents.

What to do? Turn her from squatter into house sitter. Perfect! But is it perfect? I kept asking Pat if I could make a video about this because I think it’s brilliant. And he said NO! We don’t know what will happen while we renovate the house. We don’t know what will happen when we need her to move. Well, she was great. She didn’t bother the crew at all. She kept to herself. She left ZERO messes. I mean we’ve NEVER had a house sitter that clean. And just yesterday we moved a tenant in that house and we moved her to another house of ours. No drama.

My next squatter story happened yesterday. Jeff, our crew leader, went to meet Pat at a house they were about to start only to see a man walk out of the house. Pat showed up and saw Jeff speaking with this man outside so Pat approached them only to learn that this man was squatting in our house.

Pat is a master negotiator. He should work for the FBI or CIA. He would probably be good with hostage situations too. So Pat kindly told the man that he needs to move out of our house. And that man lazily said he’d get around to it. Pat told him no, it needs to be done right now. Let’s go.

They entered the house only to discover the living room and kitchen were curtained off with sheets. Our old stove that came with the house was open and heating the house. There’s no furnace there of course. It’s a vacant house. And there was a HUGE flat screen TV on the mantle of the fireplace, a table and some chairs and TWO MORE MEN!

Pat at first was concerned it was a drug den but he saw no drug paraphernalia. Pat quickly deduced it’s a place these guys were using as their man cave and probably to sell marijuana from.

Pat used his skills of peacemaking and got these guys to pack it up and move it out. They didn’t want police showing up and looking for their warrants probably. They don’t strike us as the types that will be back either. But who knows?

This just happened yesterday. Our female house sitter is in a different house that has a furnace. We’re not feeling like we want her to move into this house just in case these guys do come back. But for now it’s all good because we don’t have anything of value there yet. What will we do to secure it once we do? That is TO BE DETERMINED.

Moral of the story: Buy a house that already has a newly vetted paying tenant in it so you don’t have to deal with these issues until that tenant moves out. And be ready with your plan for when that tenant moves out. Have someone lined up to house sit, remove the furnace and hot water heater, board it, DAWGS doors it — but don’t leave it gaping open welcoming in the thieves and squatters!