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I would have laughed if they told me they were going to tear up the carpet to check for stains UNDER IT. Um no? The carpet is clean, that's all that matters, who cares if the pad might have a stain? If she didn't have pets would they do that?
I would have fought it from the beginning and said "if you tear up the carpet, that is on you, I will take you to small claims court if you try to replace the carpet on my dime."
I would have taken pictures AND VIDEO of the carpet looking just fine.
Did you put anything in writing about the pets? If not I'd probably still try small claims, can't hurt.
Right there in red. Hey I was with you about the blame at first until I reread the OP and she admitted damage.
Take some Pepto for that heartburn.
Oh, Lord, look at the next line...but there were no stains on the carpet. In other words, if there was damage to the carpet, she'd be willing to pay for it. But there wasn't any visible damage.
C'mon, you're just messing with me now. LOL on the Pepto. That stuff is nasty.
Quote:
Originally Posted by beera
I would have laughed if they told me they were going to tear up the carpet to check for stains UNDER IT. Um no? The carpet is clean, that's all that matters, who cares if the pad might have a stain? If she didn't have pets would they do that?
I would have fought it from the beginning and said "if you tear up the carpet, that is on you, I will take you to small claims court if you try to replace the carpet on my dime."
I would have taken pictures AND VIDEO of the carpet looking just fine.
Did you put anything in writing about the pets? If not I'd probably still try small claims, can't hurt.
I lean strongly toward there having been an odor. We've done that before, many times. The carpets look fine, but there is a strong pet odor we just can't get rid of, so we pull back the carpet (which doesn't damage the carpet in any way, and if there isn't a problem, it can easily be put back into place), and find that the odor is coming from the carpet backing and the pad, even though it looks fine on the surface. Sometimes, the backing of the carpet can be cleaned and it helps. Sometimes, only the pad needs to be replaced. Sometimes, even though it looks fine on the surface, everything underneath is completely saturated with urine, and you have to not only replace, but Killz the flooring underneath. We don't know until we pull up the carpet and look.
We have a current judgment, granted by a judge in court, against a tenant who had dogs who peed on the carpet in several rooms. We had to replace the whole house because the carpet was no longer made, so it would have all not matched. We prorated, based on the age of the carpet, and the judge agreed with us.
So basically, exactly the situation the tenant has described, and we won. I suppose that depends a lot whether you live in a landlord friendly or tenant friendly state. My state is very landlord friendly. If you live in California, it would likely be a very different result.
My point is that "Looks just fine" is not the only thing that matters.
I will concede that if there wasn't an odor, the landlord is out of line, but I can't imagine any landlord doing this if there wasn't an odor.
I lean strongly toward there having been an odor. We've done that before, many times. The carpets look fine, but there is a strong pet odor we just can't get rid of, so we pull back the carpet (which doesn't damage the carpet in any way, and if there isn't a problem, it can easily be put back into place), and find that the odor is coming from the carpet backing and the pad, even though it looks fine on the surface.
Exactly. I notice throughout this thread that some posters talk about "ripping out/up" and "tearing up" the carpet when, as you pointed out, "pulling back" carpeting (and particularly carpeting which is only two years old) is the norm and perfectly easy to do. As I mentioned earlier, many pet owners simply don't smell the odor ...
If it were an odor issue I'd be more understanding, but the OP hasn't mentioned odor, just stains.
If they had said "the carpet smelled so bad we had to replace it" that would be different than "the pad had stains on it."
It's just the pad! You can't see it, so if they were bugging about "pad stains" I'd think the managment company was crazy and refuse to pay.
If they had just pulled up the carpet and not tore it out, they could have put it right back down. But I assume since they say they HAVE TO replace it because of stains underneath then they tore it out. I question the validity of the stains lol. I mean where's the proof of staining? Pictures? A company estimate? I'd want receipts as well.
I'd definitely be getting more info and again refusing to pay if the terms "odor" had never once been mentioned, specially if it's documented in any way that they were only talking about stains.
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