The balancing act around making and charging for repairs...

[Jeremy Rusnak]

Hi all,

Dug around trying to find something specific to my topic without much success...

While at one of my properties today for an unrelated issue, I happened to notice a hole in the drywall in the hallway.   Not big, but noticeable.  The tenant has not mentioned it to me at all.  I do have a clause in my lease that damage should be reported and that I will inspect units every six months.

When you notice something like this how many of you feel like you want to take care of it right away?   What's your threshold for letting something wait?   And if it's clearly negligent, how do you handle charging the tenant for something that might normally come out of the security deposit at move out?

I've been being the "good landlord" who just fixes wear and tear unless it was obviously intentional.  However, I don't want to end up in a situation where I'm repairing everything for free.   And fixing three holes at once is cheaper than fixing one hole on three separate visits, but I feel like if a place starts to look beat up the tenant and/or guests aren't going to treat things with as much respect.  (Not that I am getting a lot of holes, just illustrating a concept!)

How did you folks learned to strike the right balance? 

[Peter MacKercher]

Going to throw in behind @Tony Christian here, but slightly different. I agree that you need to establish what the relationship is between the tenant, the property and you as a landlord. Letting that sort of thing slip could lead to more disregard and everyone who goes to the property is a potential renter, so you want to keep the presentation of the property up. If you're doing your part to upkeep the property then it's fair to expect the same from the tenant, which is basically what my advice follows.

Just ask the tenant what happened so you know the root of the problem. I'd then inform them that they need to fix it within 30 days, and that if they don't fix it then you'll fix it and charge them for the repair. That way they have the option of avoiding the charge and fixing the problem for you, and if they did a bad job then it wasn't really fixed and you can explain that they'll be charged for the repair to their repair then. I wouldn't touch the security deposit because in my mind that's for the move out solely, even if you're going to replenish it to full.