Tenant pays first $100.00 in maintenacne???

[Account Closed]

I was having a chat with a co-worker over Slack about ways to keep costs low in rentals. He was in a different state than me, and had years more RE experience than I have. His background was acquisitions and purchasing large tapes of properties. He said something that struck me, and I didn't really want to fact check him in the group setting. So I'll bring it here.

"Write it in your lease's that the renter is responsible for the first $100.00 of any issue. You can put in language that negates the charge should it be a major CAPEX like an HVAC. This prevents erroneous maintenance requests, or a tenant trying to get you to upgrade the property through work orders. Before occupancy, you need to have a thorough inspection (with pictures) done in person that they sign, along with a healthy deposit (no $99 move in specials). That will keep them from calling every time the floor squeaks, and taking care of things a little bit better since they know they can't pull the 'it was that way when we moved in.'"

What do yall think of that? It seems smart, but is it legal?

[Frank Jiang]

It depends on your tenant.  If your tenant lives hand to month like many others, I would personally recommend against this because the tenant will be disincentivized from doing repairs or even informing you of major repairs even when absolutely necessary.  The problems that arise from not performing necessary maintenance can be much more expensive than a few hundred dollars of maintenance and I personally see it as penny wise pound foolish.