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I don't understand how a situation like this can happen. The tenet and I do a walk through with a check sheet before they move in. I inspect the property 30 days after they move in, and every 90 days thereafter.
If there is any sign of damage, I nip it in the bud immediately, and don't wait for them to move out before discovering they destroyed the place. If the place doesn't meet my standards, they are evicted immediately.
The day before the tenet moves out, I do a walk through with tenet and check sheet, so there are no surprises to anyone involved.
I wouldn't dream of letting someone live for years with no periodic inspection.
Turning up after 30 days and every 90 thereafter is tantamount to harassment. Why bother being a LL if you're so incompetent that you feel the need to "check" so often? The tenants (note the correct spelling btw) are paying for their use (that includes quiet enjoyment of same) of your property without you being constantly in their face for no reason but your insecurity as a LL.
I do things different than you and for the following reasons;
I do believe a tenant has the right to have privacy and not be getting a LL in the house they rent every 90 days and 30 days after they moved in. That to me would be very annoying if I were the tenant. I have always gotten my full deposit back and I have been living in 7 rental properties in my life and never had any LL coming over to check during the lease period.
I make pictures before the tenant moves in and do the same when they move out. I hire official companies to do the work and that way have proof of everything that needed to be repaired and or replaced.
With the last tenant I was every month (for the last couple of months) at the property because they paid in cash. They started paying the first month, non refundable pet fee and security deposit in cash and later paid by check, even gave me 3 postponed dated checks. After that it became different and not for the best. They started to come up with stories to pay 1 day late, than 3 days late....and I always had to email them, call them, etc...and on several occasions I emailed them that the rent needed to be paid on time by sending the mail to my P.O. Box and that we never agreed I would pick up the rent. (He paid a large amount in late fees) One day after a couple of calls from my side he told me I could come by and he had the rent amount ready. When I arrived he only had a partial amount and I told him I never take anything other than full payments...and he started to wave the dollar bills in front of me and said "tempting isn't it", which was very disrespectful and wrong doing that in front of his 7 yr old child, who made remarks how I took all their money....
I already noticed spots in the carpet (I never walked further than standing in the front door) and told them they needed to remove it. The next time it looked much better and the living room always looked decent to the eye.
I also told them they shouldn't have the windows open all the time and if mold would start growing due to the FL. humidity they would be responsible for the cost and that according to our contract it wasn't allowed. neither was leaving the garage door open the whole day and when they weren't home when I had the appointment to pick up the rent I noticed all doors and windows were left open. The HOA had send me a violation letter for that address.
I had noticed a couple of calls due to domestic disturbance to the cops, that is why I tried not to get into anything too much and rather waited till they moved out and just emailed them instructions for the security deposit to be paid in full. He responded to the email, the certified letter I sent them about a similar thing was returned and never opened.
If you do so many checks on the property and then you need to have potential new tenants see the property, I wonder if a tenant has the rright to refuse to all this intrusion since they have the right to privacy.....JMO!
You are more worried about the tenet's privacy that protecting your property. If you don't inspect, you are gambling. Most Property Management business' do 30/90 day inspections, that is where I got the idea. You tell the people before renting so it isn't a surprise. Anyone who would object isn't welcome to live in my expensive home. An inspection takes a few minutes, and can be done when rent is collected. My mainteneace man also gives me condition reports any time he enters the property. If you don't watch out for your property, no one is is going to..!
It is not intrusive if done properly, with proper notice. I don't care if the bed isn't made and the dishes are dirty, I do care if the screens are broken/removed, holes in the walls, undue wear or stains on the carpet, etc.
You can also find problems that should be taken care of immediately, like a minor leak. Renters will let things go that can cost you money by the time you find the problem.
One time I let someone slide, and paid big time. A local police officer with a great reputation rented the home, and I let the inspections slide. That cost me thousands, so no one gets a break any more. I would think you have learned that lesson by now.
This is a business, not a feel good experience.
There was a time when I would have objected to LL inspections as an invasion of privacy. And on a personal level, I still think it's kind of excessive every 90 days.
But now that I'm renting from a negligent LL for the first time, I would love to rent from someone who cares enough about his property to check up on it once in a while. When I moved in here, the place was filthy. I even found a dead mouse carcass in the laundry room, and it had been there a WHILE. Dead bugs in the linen closet. Thick grease all over the kitchen. It makes me ill just to think about it. But I naively assumed that the prior tenants were the filthy ones, and it wasn't the landlord's fault. Turns out that the previous resident of this house was the landlord! She was the one living happily with dead bugs and mouse turds and never cleaning the place!
So big surprise that now I have to fight with her over even simple repairs. I am this close to putting my rent in escrow. I am sure that a LL who cares enough about his property to do inspections would not allow a dishwasher to be broken for 2 months, or a dryer to be broken for weeks. I am also sure that a LL who cares enough to do inspections would not leave me with mouse corpses to clean up on move-in. At this point, I'm happy to say, bring on the nosy landlords, they're a world better than the negligent ones!
We're about to lease out our property without using a property management company, now that I have a license and actually have a clue about this. And we'll be going by quarterly to change out the AC filter (had an AC wear out before its time because even though we purchased and provided the filters, the tenants just never got around to changing them, and that's expensive) and make sure detector batteries are working, take care of any minor repairs that haven't been reported (ones that ARE reported will be taken care of right away, of course), etc. It will be made clear up front that we'll be doing that, and why - it's just part of the service of keeping the house in good shape for the tenants that are living there. We'll also be popping by to do some landscape maintenance, as well (there's part of it that is, frankly, a royal pain, and better we should take care of it than the tenants have to or simply let it go).
^^^ I understand what you are saying and different houses can ask for different ways of being inspected. My properties are inbetetr areas and no older than 4 years...so the chances of what you describe are rear in my situation and people choose to live in a resort style way of living for a reason. As I stated i never had any inspection done to me when I rented and I never had any issues, neither do I have with other renters...but the one before and this one. The one before was fine until a few days before last month was going to start. I did an inspection and to be safe we taped it with permission from the tenant and from what we could see it wasn't any major things...then a few days later they vanished just before paying last month...I did have the security deposit and got a judgment for additional issues.
In this case (and I'm not making any excuses) I was in the home with 1 potential tenant who ended up renting it and had a showing. At that time I noticed the "No cleaning of the bathrooms" and that everything needed to be painted. The tenant who lived there already stated and had emailed me before he would paint the entire house before moving out and he did start and painted half the house...what I couldn't know was that he didn't put any cover on the vinyl floor in the kitchen so it was covered with paint...
The rooms were not messy and additional spots in the carpet were covered by shoes or furniture and he told me he would clean all the bathrooms and kitchen...
Even though the house was painted, we only discovered that bridges that are between the window and window screen were vanished, when I went to order new window screens and one or the alumium I took for the size was recognized by the employee as being a bridge ....later I went back and noticed all 3 were missing. I hadn't noticed, neither had any of my family members, and by checking our pictures from last year we could see they were there....
Most of the things we discovered were to see when the house was empty. Do you check all the blinds if they are clean and ink is on there? You have to check all 19 blinds to see it...I don't think an inspection would have brought this to the light or we would have checked every little tiny thing.
I also go by the advise (which to me is good advise) from the LL-tenant website and they are stating it is better not to do a walk through with a tenant to avoid nasty discussions or even worse. You never know who you dealing with when things are not the positive way for them.
I had one tenant moving out from another property who had taken a mirror from us (decorative) and we told him he could either return it or we would distract it from the security deposit...that already was not very nice how he reacted and he wanted proof it was ours, which we had. (pictures and receipt)....so I rather think about our safety and avoid these situations.
This tenant had recently lost his job and I guess his cleaning standards were not the same as ours...and his mood swings are something to consider in how and what we do. I rather do it the legal way and by email/certified mail than in person....
His wife once called me to appologize for a nasty email he had sent me....but I told her I never ever got a nasty email which was the truth...and that was when i told them I would go to court if he didn't pay the late rent before a certain date...the tenant him self even appologized for it while I was showing the home to the new tenant who was standing there and it was kind of awkward.
Our first tenant left the house like she got it. Yes, she did get it riddled with fleas, did get it with the windows broken, did get it with cats urine all over the hardwood floors, did get it with holes in the walls, did get it with the dishwasher broken, did get it with the basement door broken ; window and all, did get it with the bathrooms rotten with dirt.
She was evicted because of the damage she was causing. then turned around and sued me for her deposit. Too bad I took photos of the house after she moved out, along with photos of workers itching themselves after walking thru the house. It was 2 months rent ; $2400.
Guess what ; she lost. And I then sued her father to recover at least $5000 more in damage(he cosigned the lease, real estate lawyer!!). We settled with her father for $3000 even though if it went to the judge, he would have probably given it all to me. But I felt bad for her father having such a deadbeat daughter.
Another tenant just cannot clean. The place is filthy, dirt you wouldnb believe. But I cannot force them to clean ; I dont have to live with it ; as long as the rent is paid, I will ride it and when they move out then we will redo the whole house and SELL IT. I cant wait to get out of the rental business. When my tenants call, I do jump and fix things within the day or so. Just dropped $500 into this place due to the fact that the tenant clogged all the sinks and baths with THEIR Hair!! They also broke the faucet ; how do you break the faucet?? But they dont have the money to fix it.
Its also amazing how many batteries we have gone thru for smoke alarms. I know they are in the alarms when the tenant moves in ; they have to for the permits. But its amazing how many are gone when we go to the property ; just gone and never to be replaced. Also door handles ; who in their right mind takes off door handles?
[quote=okaydorothy;12839486]Our first tenant left the house like she got it. Lol, yes they all do... Yes, she did get it riddled with fleas, did get it with the windows broken, did get it with cats urine all over the hardwood floors, did get it with holes in the walls, did get it with the dishwasher broken, did get it with the basement door broken ; window and all, did get it with the bathrooms rotten with dirt.
She was evicted because of the damage she was causing. then turned around and sued me for her deposit. Too bad I took photos of the house after she moved out, along with photos of workers itching themselves after walking thru the house. It was 2 months rent ; $2400.
Guess what ; she lost. And I then sued her father to recover at least $5000 more in damage(he cosigned the lease, real estate lawyer!!). We settled with her father for $3000 even though if it went to the judge, he would have probably given it all to me. But I felt bad for her father having such a deadbeat daughter.
Another tenant just cannot clean. The place is filthy, dirt you wouldnb believe. But I cannot force them to clean ; I dont have to live with it ; as long as the rent is paid, I will ride it and when they move out then we will redo the whole house and SELL IT. I cant wait to get out of the rental business. When my tenants call, I do jump and fix things within the day or so. Just dropped $500 into this place due to the fact that the tenant clogged all the sinks and baths with THEIR Hair!! They also broke the faucet ; how do you break the faucet?? But they dont have the money to fix it. But they do have $ for smokes and beer somehow, go figure.
My security deposit at my last rental (I have since bought a house) was substantial: $1500. I spent about $300 getting my rental professionally cleaned and having the carpets and tile floor cleaned. I got every cent of my deposit back. It was worth it to me to pay someone to do all of this, though I did personally re-paint the living room due to the damage the movers did.
It isn't rocket science.
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