Tenant wants me to pay to add interior door

[Gusatvus Johnson]

I just had new tenants (a group of guys in their 20s) move into a 4-bedroom unit. One of them, who is a contractor by trade, asked if he could install an interior door because it would make the layout of the apartment less strange. This request came after they had seen the unit and signed the lease.

Normally I would say absolutely no to a request like this, but it does benefit me because the current layout of the unit is a little weird, and the apartment should be easier to rent in the future with the new door in place. So I said OK to the door as long as he is willing to handle the work and buy the materials.

He replied that he'd do the work for free but that I should pay for the materials. That's a ridiculous request, right? It wasn't my idea to put in the door, and I never agreed to add the door as a condition of renting the apartment to them.

The tenant seemed really upset that I would not pay for materials, so I'm just looking for confirmation that I'm not in the wrong here.

I'm not worried about the cost of materials (which would be minor -- it's just a basic interior door) as much as setting a precedent with these guys about giving into bizarre requests.

[Mike Franco]

does the layout affect privacy? If not, forget it, and install one yourself later.

I would never let tenants do any work. Is he a handyman? Can he even install a door correctly?

Who's gonna paint it?

Nope.