Pet fee, pet deposit AND pet rent...

[Josue Guzman]

Hey, BP!

I thought I would post this question here since I'm planning to own rentals myself. 

I'm planning to move after I get married later this year so my fiancee and I are looking for potential places. We found a community we really liked, but they charge:

$250 non-refundable fee per pet
$250 deposit per pet
$??? pet rent /pet/month. 

Their website didn't specify how much the pet rent is but if I had to guess, it would be $20-$30.

I understand the need for paying extra for pets, but that feels like overkill. Especially since we have two lazy adult cats. Is this common or am I just overreacting? If it matters, I'm from Houston, TX and we're planning to move to the Woodlands / Conroe area. 

Thanks!

[Lynn McGeein]

We found this to be the case in the larger apartment complexes when we had to move for work several years ago.   We have a large dog so were extremely limited in choice, so we ended up paying the ridiculous fees until we found our own home.   In our investment property, we actually looked for single family homes with large fenced back yards to cater to this segment as it was so difficult to find when we needed it, and we only charge a higher refundable security deposit, no pet fee and no pet rent.  I wish I could charge a higher security deposit for each child, as they do more damage than pets, in my opinion, but we'd get in way too much trouble for that.