What are eviction leads?
An eviction case is a lawsuit a landlord files to get a tenant out of a rental property, most often for unpaid rent and sometimes for lease violations or a lease that has ended. The landlord is the plaintiff, the tenant is the defendant, and the property is usually a house or a unit that the landlord owns.
For an investor, the lead is the owner of that rental, not the person being evicted. An eviction filing tells you that a specific landlord, on a specific house, is having a bad enough time to pay court costs and go before a judge. That landlord may be losing months of rent, paying a lawyer, and looking at a turnover that could mean cleaning, repairs and a vacant stretch before anyone new moves in. Some will push through, re-rent and carry on. Others reach the point where they would rather sell the house and be done with it. Investors call these owners tired landlords.
The signs of a tired landlord tend to cluster. They own one rental or a handful, they bought years ago, they may live in another city, and the house is older and needs work. When the same house has seen more than one eviction filing in a year, the pattern is hard to ignore. An owner in that position is often open to an offer that takes the house as it is, with or without a tenant in place, and lets them stop dealing with it.
Eviction lists take more work to build than tax or foreclosure lists, because the court record usually names people, not parcels. That extra step is part of why they can be worth working.
One filing or a pattern?
A single eviction doesn't make a landlord a seller. Plenty of experienced owners file when a tenant stops paying, get the unit back and re-rent it within a month. The filing is a reason to look closer, not a verdict. The stronger signals come from what surrounds it. Has the house had more than one filing in a year? Has the same owner held it for a long time, from a mailing address in another state? Is the tax bill also behind, or is there an open code case with the city? Each of those makes it more likely the owner is losing money and patience at the same time. That's why DealSherpa keeps every filing on the house with its date and shows the other lists beside it, rather than handing you a flat list of case numbers.
Where eviction list data comes from
Eviction cases are filed in the local court that handles landlord-tenant matters. Depending on the state, that is a municipal, county, district or justice court. The public case record usually shows the filing date, the parties, the case number and the hearing schedule. Whether it also shows the rental's address varies a great deal from one court to the next.
That is the hard part of building an eviction list. Matching a landlord's name to a house is easy to get wrong: a landlord can own a dozen properties, a property manager can file in their own name for owners they work for, and a company name can be typed several ways. DealSherpa places a filing on a house only when the evidence points to one house. That means either the address in the case matched to its parcel, or, where the court gives no address, a landlord whose known rental holdings narrow to a single property. Filings that point to several houses, or to an apartment complex, are held back rather than guessed.
New cases are picked up shortly after they are filed. Some courts add the property address only after the case has been served, so a filing can appear a day or two later than its filing date once the address is in.
Access to eviction records also depends on state law. Some states limit what the public can see, or seal certain cases, so eviction coverage is set by what each court makes public.
The owner of record decides
Once a filing is placed on a house, the county property record supplies the owner's name, the mailing address and whether a person or an entity holds title. When a property manager or a master tenant filed the case, the record still shows the actual owner, because that's who can sell.
How to work eviction leads
Landlords are business owners, and they respond to a business conversation. Treat the eviction as context, not as the opening line.
- Choose your list. Houses owned by individuals and houses owned by LLCs or trusts call for different approaches. An individual with one rental is often the most motivated; a company with a portfolio may want to sell several houses at once.
- Reach the owner at their own address. Write to the mailing address from the county record, not to the rental. The tenant lives at the rental, and they are not your lead.
- Lead with relief, not the lawsuit. Something like: you buy rentals as-is, tenant in place or vacant, and you close on their schedule. Bringing up their court case in the first sentence usually ends the conversation.
- Work out the rent and the repairs. If you would keep the tenant, check the rent against the price; if the house will be vacant, budget for turnover. The BRRRR calculator and rehab estimator help.
- Come back after the hearing. A landlord who says no in the middle of a case may feel differently after a judgment, a damaged unit or another missed month. Keep them in your follow-up.
What a landlord usually wants to hear
Most landlords in the middle of an eviction care about three things: how fast you can close, whether they have to finish the eviction first, and whether they have to fix anything. Have an answer to each before you call. Some investors buy with the tenant still in place and deal with the tenancy after closing. Others will only buy once the unit is empty and price the wait into the offer. Either can work. What matters is being clear about which you are offering and what it means for the landlord's timeline. A landlord who has just spent months chasing rent will often take a lower, certain number over a higher one that depends on repairs, showings and a buyer's loan.
Respect the tenant and the case
Never contact the tenant about the eviction, and never present yourself as part of the landlord's case. If you buy a house with a tenant in it, you generally take on the lease and every landlord-tenant and fair housing duty that comes with it, so get advice on the local rules before you close. When calling or texting landlords, follow the National Do Not Call Registry, the TCPA's consent rules for automated calls and texts to cell phones, and any stricter state rules. Talk to an attorney before running a large calling campaign.
What's in a DealSherpa eviction record
The record is built around the house and the person who owns it:
- The rental property: street address, city and ZIP code
- Each eviction filing on the house, with its date
- The owner of record from the county, and whether that owner is a person or a company or trust
- The owner's mailing address, with an absentee flag when the owner lives elsewhere
- Property facts: the county's value, year built, how long the owner has held the house, and the last sale date and price
- Every other list the house is on, such as unpaid taxes or code violations, with dates
- A priority grade that rewards repeat filings and stacked problems
Tenant names are not part of the lead, and the record doesn't include phone numbers or emails for the owner. If you want to call, skip tracing is pay as you go at 12¢ per owner searched. The market pages below show anonymised samples.
Reading an eviction record
Start with the owner type and the absentee flag. A person who lives in another city and owns one rental is the classic tired landlord. Next, look at the filing dates. Two or three filings close together on one house point to a property that keeps going wrong. Last, check years owned and the last sale price. An owner who bought long ago probably has equity and room to accept a fair cash offer. One who bought recently at a high price may not.