Best Practices for Charging Damages

[Marcia Maynard]

How do you assess the dollar value for damages on items that are not easy to repair but still have useful life and aren't due for replacement? I'm not talking about normal wear and tear. I'm talking about obvious damage for which there is no easy fix, caused intentionally or by neglect or by accident.

Examples: Chips in the porcelain of an appliance, sink or tub. Nail holes in cabinet woodwork or doors. Crack in a refrigerator door shelf. Stains in the carpet or wood floor that won't come out with professional cleaning. Scratches or tears in the vinyl or wood flooring that you can't get back to looking good again. Cutting marks on laminate countertops. Dents in metal of appliances and doors. Candle burn mark on a tub surround. Etc.

Had a rule breaker "not so good tenant" mess with one of my apartments. I hate the look of something that has obviously been repaired and can't be brought back to its original look. What do you do?

[Steve Babiak]

Stains in carpet that don't come out - cost of replacing minus depreciation of original carpet.

Chips in tub - cost of resurfacing, as that would run like $250 to $350. Unless you just use one of those touch-up kits that are inexpensive, in which case it is the cost of that kit.

One thing to consider is asking "what needs to be done so that a future tenant will find that feature in that unit to be in acceptable condition?" The answer to that sort of tells you that you need to address a repair or not, and that repair cost would be your damage amount.