Chat with an American: Renting to people is great in the USA versus the South African Nightmare

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[An American wrote this to me. Jan]

He wrote:
However, I’m going through some legal stuff because of one of my renters not paying rent, and other problems he’s causing, so hiring a lawyer isn’t cheap.

I replied:
Aha! So you have renters. I did not know that. But the USA is much much better than SA in this regard. When I was there in 2019, I stayed with Americans who were renting via one of those modern methods. It’s a common thing, and it’s on the tip of my tongue. It’s run by a certain company. I was very impressed with the quality of what you could rent and how nice things work in America. You can rent a place and there is coffee and other stuff there already, and you just ensure when you leave that the place is decent. Over here in South Africa you could NEVER do that. If you had to rent a place, the Blacks would STEAL EVERYTHING. They’d empty out the fridge and would probably steal your mugs and literally anything that moves. We could NEVER function like that in SA. Furthermore, once you have someone renting, even if they don’t pay you might not be able to get them out. There would be "human rules" about how you can’t kick them out because it would be inhuman, blah blah. You would NEVER be able to get rid of them. One Boer pal of mine was stuck with people who rented who would not leave. In the end he went and removed the freaking door so that the place was open all the time. I think that is how he managed to get rid of them. Renting out property in South Africa is an insane nightmare. At one point I was wondering if buying a property, e.g. an apartment and renting it would work, and I gave up on that idea after much thought.

I’m sorry about your legal issues with a lawyer. Lawyers are insanely expensive everywhere. I think this is itself an issue that needs sorting out. Most common people struggle to get legal help. The lawyers end up working for the rich.

My best advice, from my own experiences, is learn as much law as you can. In your case since you rent, try and read up on all the fine print, etc. If you are renting as a long term thing, then study it and learn as much as possible about courts and going to the court. Just having that skill alone, in a nice country like you are in, you could, YOURSELF, open cases against people and take them to court without a lawyer. Your system is much more conducive to that. Plus you would get to know the courts, and the things you can do. Just having the POWER to open a case against someone and to begin some kind of legal proceedings, will probably scare your renters shitless. Then you have the power of the state behind you. In South Africa, nothing really works and the Blacks interpret the law as they see fit, so justice is not something one can really expect here. But your country is still a LOT more functional. Learning the law, and making some effort in that regard could save you a lot of money and give you some personal power. I’m sure in your country there might even be groups of people who help with this type of stuff. Empower yourself. It is worth it’s weight in gold. I know what it’s like to go hunting for lawyers. It’s very heavy stuff.