Garage Opener Installation

[Cody Roof]

Hey all,

Long-time lurker, first-time poster and I wanted to get some opinions.

I somewhat recently bought a house in Georgia through Roofstock and, through some underwriting bungles on my end, it's not performing great (~5% CoC Return compared to the 8-10% I had underwritten due to some unforeseen repairs and some higher fixed costs than I had predicted). So, this is a long-distance investment and I was unaware that it didn't have garage openers but I don't think that would have really changed anything.

The tenants moved in to the place in March and have paid on time for these first 2 months (not sure about May yet), so they seem like good tenants so far. I got an email from my property manager on April 20th mentioning the garage doors are inoperable, this initially sounded like a repair and I was going to just take care of it but through many back and forth emails with my PM, I determined that there were never garage openers so this changes from a repair to an improvement in my mind. 

The cost is $715 for the electrical + $702 for the garage openers (It's 2 single car garages). Total: $1,417

Which finally brings me to some questions:

- How would you guys handle this request? Would you just do it? Would you try and split the improvement cost with the tenants? 

- Would you avoid adding another thing to a property that will eventually break and require a repair? (I think I could maybe increase rents down the road for having it too though so that may offset)

- My PM mentioned that "Unfortunately this is a major component... could be grounds for your tenants to withhold rent payments". If there's nothing in the lease that promises automatic garage doors, is she incorrect?

I'm leaning towards just doing this as I have the money to do it for them and they seem like good tenants so far, it would definitely be an easier decision if I had more time with them to truly see if they would be good long-term tenants but I guess I'm just curious how the pros would handle this little issue.

Thanks,

Cody

[Kyle J.]

A few thoughts based just on what's written here.  First, you don't mention whether the door is broken in some way, or just never had an automatic opener and can still be opened just fine manually.  

Having said that, it sounds like the tenants rented it "as-is" in its current condition, so whether you upgrade it to automatic openers or not sounds like it's up to you.  But if you do decide to do it, I personally wouldn't split the cost with the tenants.  It's your property, so - in my opinion - you should pay for it (I would if it was my property).  That's your call though.

Regardless of what you decide, I would seriously consider replacing any PM that said to me what yours said to you.  There's nothing in the law that says tenants can withhold rent payments because they don't have an automatic garage door opener, especially when they rented the property that way.  So your PM is either trying to fleece you, or she's incompetent.  Either way, with you being an out-of-state landlord, it doesn't sound like she's a good person to have on your team.