How to determine appropriate amount of damage to charge on move outs ?

Question

I'm looking for the most effective strategy on determine renter costs owed upon move out :

On top of that I would like advice on my current move out situation :

Renter put his 30 day notice in Sep 1st so we started showings right away. The rental is very nice (built in 07) and had new appliances put in at the start of this past lease. The house doesn't have much damage but is pretty filthy. The appliances look 5 years old in 1 years time ; are scratched up ; carpets were not in great shape to start but are very dirty / dis colored now. The renter worked for a construction crew and obviously brought his job home with him ; hence the filth. I would like to get it deep cleaned right away to help with showings but he renter is still in until months end. How do I determine how much to charge ? (I have a $1000 deposit)

Thanks in advance :)

Curtis Bidwell · Answer

Account Closed I have $45/hr in my contract but a judge in our jurisdiction will not allow the owner anything if he does the work himself.  If I have receipts from a contractor they will allow that and they will allow receipts for materials.

Kimberly H. · Answer

Account Closed you most likely have up to 30 days to communicate with your tenant on what damages you found and how much they cost and 45 days to return the balance of the security deposit or let them know what they owe you, but that depends on your lease and your state. Take the 30 days and get invoices for work you are hiring out and log how much work you are doing yourself. Use a reasonable figure for your time that you think would be defensible in front of a judge, and add up all the numbers. As someone said, you should probably subtract off depreciation for the carpets, appliances, etc. if you think you are going to wind up in front of the judge. Also, I have heard that some judges think cleaning is part of normal wear and tear, so be careful there.

I wouldn't try to show the unit until you get it back and fix it up, otherwise you are only going to attract another filthy tenant.

Account Closed · Answer

A 70-100 dollar per hour fee for labor + costs of parts is fair I think. Check with the laws in effect in your state though. Give a details statement of the work and time that it has taken to repair the damage and include photos. The statement needs to look professional and "official". Also always wait until the tenant is out before you do any of that and send his safety deposit minus the fee along with the statement  to him by certified mail with delivery confirmation to his new address. No verbal exchange is necessary and it should be avoided in my opinion because it can generate arguments and conflict. In most cases, when the tenant receives his check for what remains of his safety deposit along with a statement explaining in detail where that money went and pictures of the damage he caused,  it is left at that.

Aaron Wyssmann · Answer

Ursula B.  completely agree with you that having possible tenants see a property before it is ready is a waste of time. Most of the time they can't look past the issues.

Here's a link to the laws in Kansas

http://www.thelpa.com/lpa/landlord-tenant-law/kansas-landlord-tenant-law.html

Aaron Wyssmann · Answer

@Westin Hudnall that's great. Glad it turned out well.

Aaron Wyssmann · Answer

The one that I've used for years is Tenant Verification Services or I think tenantverification.com.  You can run several reports here but I just do the basic credit and then do the background through our court system online.

Don't always go with nice. I've been burned before. Also a huge thing is to require first months rent and security deposit to be paid in cash, money order or cashiers check.   I had a lady write me two checks and both of them bounced...not a good day.

Roy N. · Answer

Westin:

Most of the time if we have a claim it is for cleaning and repairing a few little things, but if you are in this business for any length of time, you are bound to get a few that do real damage to a property - sometimes willfully, but just as often out of ignorance.  I cannot go into the details of our current situation, but I will state that the renovations will outweigh the amount of rent we've collected from them over the past two years.

For performance of credit checks, we use TVS (available on both sides of the border) and Rentcheck (Canada specific).  You typically need to be setup and vetted by the company in advance of being able to run credit checks  - they need to confirm that you have the appropriate facilities and controls in-place to assure privacy is maintained.

I do believe in the U.S.A. you have on-line services that get around this by having the candidate submit the credit request themselves and simply authorize you to view the results.

Roy N. · Answer

Westin:

How did they their credit and reference checks come back?

We are in the process of dealing with a "very nice and friendly" couple, inherited with one of our properties a couple of year ago, who would never have come though our normal screening process.

As for damages:  Here we do a move-in and move-out inspection of a property {as previously mentioned take lots of before and after pictures}.  We have 7-days from the time a Tenant vacates to notify the Rentalsman whether we will be filing a claim against their security deposit  - fortunately you can later file an amendment to update the claim.

Here we can charge the tenant for any repairs above normal wear and tear for the length of the tenancy (or since an item, such as a new floor, was put into service during the tenancy).  However, security deposits here are not allowed to exceed one month's rent, so the amount of damages upon which you can collect is truly limited.  As a result, we tend to conduct periodic (at least annually and as frequent as quarterly) inspections of our properties and correct damages as they are found - we then bill the Tenant immediately rather than wait for the end of the lease.

Kimberly H. · Answer

@Westin Hudnall

our rents are $1525 to $1710, but in our area that's not high end.

I'm a clean person, the daughter of a clean freak. Although I am able to figure out how to use a room without seeing it staged and can read blueprints, I would never be able to look past filth and be told it "will be cleaned". I think other clean freak people are like minded and they can make for awesome tenants. That's just my 2cents. Obviously, it's better to get the place rented as soon as you can and the only way to do so is to show it earlier than later.

James Wise · Answer

do not clean carpets until current tenant is out.

How to determine appropriate amount of damage to charge on move outs ?

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