Annual Walk throughs, Who Does these anyways?

[Michael Craig]

Do you perform an annual walk through of your unit each time an existing tenant renews a lease? Verifying if smoke detectors are functioning, appliances are running and water pipes are not leaking is a plus. Thoughts?

[Nathan Gesner]

Yes, we walk through at least once a year. Here's my process:

1. First inspection during the first six months. This is a pretty basic inspection to see how they're living and caring for the home. I document it with some basic pictures to document the condition at that time. I usually take two pictures of each room, from two different angles so it shows every wall, floor, and ceiling. If there is something of concern or a lease violation of some sort, I'll take additional photos for documentation.

2. Second inspection takes place 45-60 days prior to the current lease ending. If the tenant hopes to renew, this is my inspection to determine whether I will allow them to renew. If they are leaving, this is my inspection to determine what cleaning or repairs may be needed after they move out (either Tenant-caused or just ordinary upkeep).

3. Move-out inspection takes place if tenant vacates. This is more detailed. I used to document it with hundreds of pictures and/or video but I have employees doing inspections now so we've gone to zInspector. It's a digital checklist that walks the inspector through the process for consistency. Move-in/Move-out inspections can be compared side-by-side, we can require tenant signatures, and we can save/share the final report. Very handy for documentation purposes.

4. I also have conditional inspections. Tenant adds an unauthorized pet, we inspect and document that it was removed. Unit is vacant, we inspect to ensure heat is on and home is secured. Parking violation, we inspect that vehicle was removed. We use zInspector to document any time we visit the rental whether it's for a lease violation, maintenance, drive-by, exterior only, etc.