Can I charge a tenant for reporting non existant maintenance issues that cost me service calls?

If such charges are in your lease and allowed by state law, absolutely. But because they aren't there is no way you can legally do so. What you can do is check out the problems before making the service call. Or simply realize that any report made by this particular tenant requires more scrutiny. I know the headaches of being a landlord so excuse me as I giggle a little bit.

Yes, If a tenant reports a problem & it is found to be nothing wrong with it you can charge them for the service call.

Evicting them would be a stretch and a bit extreme. Slim to nil chance that would fly in court.

You could only evict them if they fail to pay.

Does he have a mental problem? Actually, you need to evict him before he

does something serious. I assume you require him to have had renter's insurance

during this tenancy?

when any problem is clearly the fault of the tenant go ahead and charge them for the needless calls

its no worse than women with long hair are not careful in the shower and let the shed hair build up in the sewer pipes to the point of blockage, clearly their problem not yours, or if they are not careful with the kitchen sink and it clogs up, their problem

You have a tenant with a mental problem or, possibly, his is just a trouble maker. Either way, bill him and bill him for the first erroneous call too. Of course the Fire Dept. charges. Those calls in my area are around $1,300. You got off easy. In any event, send your tenant a bill stamped "due upon receipt". If you do not have payment by the end of February, when he pays rent for March, call him and tell him either he pays his outstanding debt now or he will be promptly evicted. Don't wait more than 2 days more and immediately, file for eviction. If he wants to pay some now and some later, tell him half is due now and you will give him 30 days to pay the rest. If he argues about the actual bill, tell him that if there was a real issue, you would pay but, when there was nothing wrong with the furnace, etc., it is an unnecessary and abusive repair request and that you pay for actual repairs. False calls are his responsibility. Don't entertain long drawn out whining from your tenant.

You can also evict him by giving him 30 days notice and telling him you're doing so because his reporting of problems with the furnace and having to call the fire department cost you a total of $500.00 and you want him to vacate so you can fix the problem yourself and before he calls you to fix it as nothing was found to be wrong by the technician who inspected the furnace and it cost you money for nothing as nothing was wrong with the furnace to begin with. You can also wait until the raise in rent will be possible for you to raise the rent enough for you to recover the $500.00 within the first six months. He'll either stay and pay or leave and be out of your life. You don't need to tell him now, you'll raise the rent, just do it at the time you are able to. You did everything a landlord is supposed to do to provide a safe place to live for your tenant and there's nothing more for you to do, except inspect the furnace every week while the tenant is present and do this each and every week. Your tenant won't like you inspecting the furnace every week but you must do so to make sure there aren't any fumes or other problems with the furnace. This is now a liability issue for you as you may be held liable for any injury or death to the tenant were there to be a problem with the furnace which will result in injury or death of the tenant. I'd try and get rid of the tenant as it appears this tenant is a pain in the ****.

Probably not. It's not written into your contract, and it's not normal business procedures. And 2 calls isn't extreme. So because your going complete outside of the bounds of normal tenant relationship, you would need to go to small claims court.

If I went by just your story, you'd probably win. But there's a flip side to this, and the other story is that the guy you sent out to fix the furnace doesn't know what he's doing.

The burden of proof is on you. So now you got to hire another guy to come out and inspect the furnace to prove that the first guy knows what he's doing. Maybe you can find a cheaper way, but it's still going to be a hassle.

No, and sometimes being a landlord you have to pay for unexpected expenses.

No, it's your responsibility to evaluate tenant complaints and determine whether you need to remediate the problem. You cannot charge a tenant for a false alarm that you yourself called into the fire department. In fact in both cases you made the choice that led to your own expenses. Depending on your state such an improper charge would at the very least break your lease and at the most could get you sued for fraudulent billing.

If you can't be bothered to personally check on problems with your property, you should pay a management company.

Yes