Imagine my surprise when I received a phone call at 7 am from my Dad, telling me that one of our rental properties had finally made the front page of the Edmonton Journal. Unfortunately he was correct, the photo below is one of our properties. I instantly recognized the house, and the people standing out front, surrounded by yellow police tape and speaking with the officer, were most certainly tenants of ours.

The only fortunate thing was that our house was not the scene of the crime, only an innocent bystander in the whole unfortunate situation.  A young girl had been murdered in the duplex next door during a home invasion in the middle of the night. Simply an awful situation, I cannot imagine for one second what her parents were going through. The house next door has had its share of problems and problematic tenants over the years, but this one was beyond belief, like something out of a movie. The worst part about it was that it appeared to be a completely random act of violence.

Now we had a tough situation on our hands, as our tenants had just given notice the week before, and we were in the process of showing the unit to re-rent it for the end of the month.

Within a few days, the police tape came down, life for us returned to normal, and we were able to start showings again. We found new tenants who moved in a few short weeks later, and everything in the neighborhood settled down, but for that week we felt as if we may have to sit vacant for the rest of the year.  Just another interesting week in the interesting life of a real estate investor.

By Chris Stepchuk Aug 6, 2013