Can a landlord claim hours put into repairs?

Question

We had a long term tenant move out in early November. They left the house in such a poor state that it took me over two months to effect all the repairs. We also live 45 miles away from the property, so I had to make something like 25 separate trips to the house - I ended up taking an inflatable mattress to the house and staying there for a few weeks to speed the process up and stop all the driving back and forth.

We are taking the tenant to small claims court, and I just need to be clear on a couple of points -

- Someone told us that, as the landlord, I can't claim the time I put into the repairs, only the associated costs - is that true? If so, it's kind of counterproductive, as I do all the work to keep costs down. If we got contractors to do all the work for the sake of making a claim it would end up three times the overall cost.

- Can I claim the gas and mileage for all the driving back and forth?

Thanks

Greg M. · Answer

You can claim cost of materials only. Yes, it makes no sense to try and save the tenant money by doing the repairs yourself. You can patch and paint something and claim the $25 for materials, but not another $50 for you time. Instead you can hire someone for $300 + $25 in materials. Makes no sense, but it's the law.

You can also claim reasonable downtime of the unit. If the repairs (not normal wear and tear repair) took a week, you can claim that week of lost rent. You can't claim two months since you did it yourself as no professional would have taken two months.

In the future, get a quote for price and time from a 2-3 professionals. You can do the work yourself and take the quotes to court. The quotes validate the amount of damages. The fact that you're now doing the repairs yourself is meaningless.

Nathan Gesner · Answer

You are correct that the laws suck. In almost every aspect, the Landlord is treated as the one with power and therefore the most likely to cheat, even though the opposite is true. This puts you in the difficult position of doing the work yourself to save money while also taking away your chance for compensation.

The truth is, you'll probably never see a dime of it anyway. Get a judgment for the maximum allowed, send it to a collection agency, and then write it off. If you get something, that's a bonus.

Stephen Bishop · Answer

Isn't it lovely? There's always one in the crowd who basically wants to hop on to a thread, not so much to really offer advice, but to preen, posture and pontificate.

As a point of fact, we've had tenants do considerable damage in the past - more so that even this house - but we never bothered chasing them on that score  because it would have been a waste of money filing in the case. It should also have been self-evident from the thread that we've had past issues with other tenants, but clearly you were in too much of a rush to pat yourself on the back.

Furthermore, where did I say i was hiring a lawyer? We always file ourselves and, as was pointed out earlier, it can reap results down the track. It also renders a useful service to other prospective landlords down the track as the action will show up on a background check, though I dare say that thinking of others isn't really in your bailiwick. In just about every case, the former tenant has never shown up in court, which means the judgement is made in our favor. For a couple of hundred to file it's worth it, just knowing that it goes on their record for seven years and sets a flag for others.

As for the work we do, I grew up in a real estate family, spent my weekends helping renovate houses, and basically know how to do everything needed to a house short of building it from the foundations up. An 'investor' like you, on the other hand, no doubt has to pay a pile of contractors 3 - 4 times as much to get the work done, which means that we often pick up houses that people like you can't afford because the margins aren't there. Most of our houses have been purchased as foreclosures and short sales (an art in itself for the latter) that were in a very poor state and needed extensive work, costs that we could minimize due to the fact I can do 95% of the work myself. To prospective homeowners or investors without those skill sets, such houses are total anathema because of the associated contractor costs - we, on the other hand, can squeeze seamlessly into that groove and pick up houses that few people want, at great prices. Congratulations though on figuring out that you set up a rental property differently to how you would set up your own home - did you learn that at some real estate seminar, or work it out on your own?

So here's a hot tip - if you want to go blow your horn telling everyone how great you are, start a separate thread, instead of looking for other people's posts as an excuse to wax rhapsodic about your extraordinary talents. It just makes you come across as a tiresome boor.

Linda S. · Answer

@Stephen Bishop,

So you're saying a tenant trashed you house,  and left thousands in damage... welcome to being a landlord!

Personally,  we do C/D rentals, and you can take people to court, but getting water from a dry wall is pointless IMO.    If you can file yourself, great-- but I wouldn't spend thousands for a lawyer in hopes of getting something back, chances are you won't.    Do you want to keep track of this person, when they switch jobs?  No thanks.   I'd say cough it up as the cost of doing business.   This might have been the first to screw you over, definitely won't be the last!  Stressing about someone  screwing you over, not worth it-- just focus on fixing it and moving on.    Maybe I'm lazy, but I just focus on what makes me money-- that's getting new tenants!

Depending on the type of rental, you may be creating lot more work than is needed.   I see this a lot with newer investors, they try and make it perfect when a good cleaning and a couple upgrades are all you need! We just had someone trash a house, and we were worried we'd have to replace the carpet and add new laminate ($2500).. nope--- $50 carpet cleaner rental later, it looks amazing and new tenants have moved in!  Work Smarter-- not harder.

You can write off the materials, mileage and gas I believe-- but you can't pay yourself.

Stephen Bishop · Answer

Oh yeah. We have fallen for a few people, and paid the cost of it. My wife is a staunch Lutheran, and she's sometimes easy prey for people willing to play on her beliefs - the couple of crosses hanging from her neck are always pretty evident (I've joked with her that she she should hide them when we're meeting prospective renters). Some years ago we had a young woman, with a couple of kids, approach us for one of our rental properties. She claimed she didn't have enough money for the deposit because she'd been saving for an annual mission to Costa Rica with her church. That obviously impressed my wife - and me for that matter - so we agreed to let her move in and pay off the deposit. Well, within a matter of months she fell way behind on the rent, then just packed up and disappeared - she even left her dog behind, as well as a turtle - if I hadn't found them when i went round to change the locks they would have died. I managed to re-home the dog, and set the turtle up in our own home with a proper tank. We found out later from others that the young woman is a shameless con artist who owed money all over the area where this particular house is located.

So another lesson learned - no matter the sob story, don't let anyone move in if they claim to be under financial stress - it's no way to start the business relationship. They have all the necessary money, or they don't. It's easier said than done, as we've had some people come through that broke my heart and left me wondering if I'd end up reading about them in the paper for having killed themselves. It's one of the hardest parts to this business, that you can be left feeling as if you're carrying the entire weight of someone's life and family on your shoulders when all you're trying to do is rent out a place. It absolutely kills us, which is one of the reasons we've been considering handing the houses to a property manager.

From a business perspective, we have got better at picking people and we're small enough that we can discriminate, though not on racial, religious, or gender grounds - just certain personality types that ring alarm bells, based on our experience. Example? If we meet a couple, I look to see what kind of balance they have in their relationship. Why? Because if one of them really dominates the other, or comes across as the large and in charge type, they're going to bring that same combative and overpowering attitude to the relationship with you as the landlord. In every instance where we've had that type of person as a tenant, they've been a real pain to deal with.  Live and learn. :)

Jeff T. · Answer

@Stephen Bishop

I hear you. I have everything with property managers now. It was too easy to fall for a story.

A decent property manager can handle everything efficiently and fairly.

Even my previous property manager fell for some of them. I have done better recently.

Karla Simmons · Answer

@Stephen Bishop

I too thought we would be able to charge for our time and labor when fixing rentals between tenants. It’s a bummer that we can’t. Glad you’re health is better now.

Stephen Bishop · Answer

Thanks. It wasn't much fun, I can tell you. At one point cancer reared its ugly head, but the doctors have since cleared me of that - thankfully.

Karla Simmons · Answer

@Stephen Bishop I’m sorry to hear that this happened to you. Especially while dealing with health issues.

Stephen Bishop · Answer

Sometimes it pays off, but not often.

We had a tenant abscond from one of our houses owing us a great deal of money - this was back in the day when we only ever asked for the first month and a deposit. We took her to court, she of course didn't turn up, and the court found in our favor - but no money, of course. Fast forward three years, and we were approached by a collection specialist who offered a 50/50 deal to go after her. With nothing to lose we said 'go for it' - he ended up being successful, and with interest thrown in got her to agree to pay something like $5600 - I'm a little hazy on the exact figure. So we ended up with half of that in a situation where we'd written the whole thing off.

As you say, the landlord is always perceived as the villain of the piece, a fat cat who does nothing more than sit back, rake in 'all the money' and count it. Never mind mortgages, taxes, insurance, repairs, etc. My wife and I are decent people who bend over backwards trying to treat our tenants decently and kindly, even though it's supposed to be a business with an appropriate business-like attitude. In almost every instance - as with the couple in question who were in this house for seven years - we've been burned for that kindness, and it can get very demoralizing, especially with a legal system that's so heavily biased against landlords. My wife and I have looked long and hard at putting our properties in the hands of a management company, and may well do so, as it will remove us from the day to day angst and put it all at a full business footing.

Can a landlord claim hours put into repairs?

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