Deferred maintenance w/ inherited tenants.

[Matt Miller]

I purchased an occupied duplex in January. Since then the tenants have paid rent on time and have been easy to work with. However there is some deferred maintenance that that came up in the inspection that the seller opted to knock down the purchase price instead of fixing himself.

The item in question is a bathroom that has significant water damage. What is the best way to go about making these repairs while the unit is occupied?

Considerations

* I am not a professional, but I would like to do the repairs myself.

** This is the only bathroom in the unit, so I would be shutting things down for the duration of the project.

*** Single male tenant.

[PJ M.]

How good are you with your DIY skills?  Is that 2-3 days accurate for your skill level or is that a ballpark based on what you read it should take?  Will the repairs take the bathroom completely out of commission?  

If you just read that this should take someone 2-3 days and you aren't an experienced DIYer then follow Murphy's Law that it will take you longer.  Estimate at least another 40% of time.  So we're looking at 16-24 hours of pure work (2-3 days at 8 hours per day) then bump that up to 23-34 hours of actual work.  If you were thinking of 2-3 days working 10 hours per day then I'd consider it more like 28-42 hours of work.

it's going to take the bathroom out of commission for that entire time then it might be worthwhile to see if a pro can get it done in less time.  If a pro can get it done in a day it might end up being a money saver.  Taking the bathroom out of commission for that long would make the place uninhabitable.  

If the bathroom would be able to be used safely while the reno is going on, I'd just offer the tenant a bit of a discount for the inconvenience.