Unfortunately, there are thousands and thousands of people throughout the United States that are not able to support themselves due to a variety of reasons. As a result, this leads to some people moving into vacant houses that they do not own. These people are known as squatters.
This obviously presents some problems for property owners as you cannot sell or move into the property until this issue has been resolved. If you find yourself in this situation, here are a few tips to help you learn how to deal with squatters.
Send a Written Notice
You may not want to immediately take legal action as it can extend the process of trying to evict the squatters. In this case, you can start by providing a written notice to the squatters telling them to leave your property immediately and that they are trespassing.
You want to make sure to have this in writing just in case the squatters do not comply. If you eventually have to take the matter to court, you can present the notice as evidence that they are staying in your property without permission.
Consult with an Attorney
If you decide you need to take legal action, you should seriously consider consulting with an attorney experienced in carrying out evictions. The reason you need an attorney is that every state has different laws regarding squatters’ rights. For example, in some states, the property owner is not able to call the police to have the squatters removed.
An attorney can help you understand your state’s policies and help you quickly and efficiently evict the squatters from your real estate property.
Contact the Police
If your written notice fails to get the squatters to leave and you don’t yet want to hire an attorney, you can consider calling the police. However, remember that not all states permit the use of police force to evict squatters from a property. It is important that you check to see what your state’s laws are before taking this step.
If this is permitted in your state, you can call law enforcement and they may be able to evict the squatters.
Change Your Locks
Once the squatters have successfully been evicted, it is important that you change all the locks in your property to ensure that they can’t get back in. In some cases, squatters will try to return to the property as they know that no one lives there, and they may be able to get back in unnoticed.
While these are not all the steps you can or should take to remove squatters from your real estate property, they are the first steps that should be considered and may be the most effective.
Squatters can present several issues for real estate investors and homeowners. If you find yourself in a situation in which your property has been taken by squatters, consider taking these steps to resolve the issue quickly and efficiently.
