Water heater in master closet (Leave it or move it?)

[Phillip Rosin]

I recently acquired two duplexes and will be doing a live in reno on one of the units. It's a total gut job and I'm trying to plan everything out. One thing I personally dislike is that the master closet, which is your standard 5' wide closet, houses the water heater. However, I'm unsure if it will actually make a difference when it comes to renting this unit out in the future and if it would be worth relocating. 

There is only one viable idea I have come up with so far and that is to add an extra little closet in the living space, next to where the washer and dryer are housed. Since all plumbing is currently below the slab, I would then have to route new plumbing to the various fixtures through the attic. However, this is a small, 1080sqft 3/2 and the kitchen, laundry and bathrooms are all along a straight line path. It *should* be relatively simple to drop pipes at each location. All the kitchen and bathroom plumbing will be updated during this process anyway, so there wouldn't be more work than routing the pipes in the attic. The longest run in the attic, from the heater to the master shower, will be around 20ft. The other thing to note is the heater is from 2005, meaning it is nearing the end of useful life anyway. This is a B/B-, mostly blue-collar area in Clearwater, FL. Rent is $1,500.00.