All Forum Posts by: Chris G.

@Adam Martin yes I agree, we had a vendor we use a lot suggest upgrading the a/c but owner didn't like/ believe that so he sent his own a/c tech out there who said what I mentioned above. 

Over the weekend I had a tenant reach out about the a/c not turning on what so ever, it's around 95 outside so the unit got up to around 80-85 with 4 tenants inside. I told him I sent the issue over to the vendor but it likely wont get worked on until Monday. The vendor goes out on Monday and does a leak test and service call he notes that it's around 1 lb short on refrigerant and the tenants can't keep the a/c at 72 like they would. Now after cleaning or whatever they did the a/c has been working fine for past day holding temp. The vendor states the a/c broke due to the tenants keeping it in the low 70s, causing it to freeze and auto shut off and that tenants would have to keep it above 74-75 from now on. Owner is upset he has to pay since he blames the tenants for keeping it so low and wants the bill to be charged to the tenants.

My question mainly is can I even tell the tenants what they "have" to keep the thermostat at going forward? I feel that's pushing it. I have some tenants that they keep the unit at 79 and others at 70 due to whatever they're comfortable at. I also think it would be pushing it to charge the tenants for this when there is nothing saying they have to keep the thermostat at 74-75. Has anyone dealt with something similar?

New here to the commercial side of things so apologize in advance if these are basic questions. We have a commercial space for rent which the tenant signed the lease and paid already. However they are now in the process of getting utilities on and a permit for their business. I'm assuming even though they can't move in yet this is there responsibility and we shouldn't prorate their rent because of this. Also in order for them to get their permit they need the certificate of occupancy now I've tried finding this answer online but haven't came with a clear answer. Is this something the tenant can acquire or is it the owners responsibility to do (current owner doesn't have copy)? Should the certificate of occupancy been given to the tenant at the lease signing or now that he's requesting it? 

@Account Closed

I don't see any issue with this, you got a formal bid for getting the painting done which was more then you did it for yourself, I don't see that being an issue at all if it was necessary. Utilities they should have paid for so that was fine taking from the sd. I saw some mention the cleaning is a ripoff but honestly we pay around $300-600 of a 2-3 bedroom condo to be cleaned so I think that's normal, the carpet is hard to say since they usually age in general I know for our lease we require the tenants to deep clean it if there are stains or smell. I personally don't see an issue with doing the work yourself or hiring a vendor as long as it's of decent quality it shouldn't matter. 

@David Lemont

Would you be managing the property yourself? Or taken into consideration the maintenance costs in case something breaks. Is there anyway in particular you figured out that rent price or just other homes around the area are going for that much. It's hard to say in your case because if you're advertising yourself and screening tenants yourself it may take longer to rent/ find a qualified tenant. If all of that has been taken into consideration it sounds fine. Like a few others have mentioned though rent being paid 100% on time and full occupancy is hard to get perfect there may be a few months of vacancy or late rent. 

There's quite a few condos/ homes we manage with HOA they usually don't seem to care or mind rentals as long as the fees are paid and the tenants follow the regulations they have. Usually we give the tenants the hoa rules when moving in. One thing I've noticed is the rental unit might be getting $1200-1600 a month but HOA fee's are $200-300 for ours. Not too sure about Airbnb though.

In our lease it states the tenants are responsible for pest control while occupying the property. Even if they didn't have a pest spray done while living there they should have cleaned it after vacating the property. 

@Courtney Duong yes that's what I'm doing for tenants going forward, I figured since they we're an existing tenant with the signs/ writing already up they would feel they don't need to go through that process of reviewing. Or since they had them up prior to me taking over I would be over stepping asking them to change it. 

Manage a 4 unit commercial plaza, one tenant is franchise and the sign is very professional, the other tenant has a large window decal that looks professional too, the other tenant however has tinted out the windows so dark you can't see inside and used these window markers to write their social medias on there which looks awful tbh they do have a small window decal on the door but you can barely see it from a distance. I don't find the shop to look very welcoming with the tint or smeared markers for the social medias which I feel also makes the plaza look bad. In the lease it pretty much just states they need to keep up with maintenance and follow the laws for signs/ advertising. It also states they need to get permission but because they we're a tenant before I managed that's why they didn't have to ask me. Would I be over stepping to have them only use real signs/ decals and no tint rather then markers or is it typically the tenants right to choose how they advertise their business?

Do vendors have a deadline of when they need to submit bills by, I have a feeling the answer is no. Most of our vendors submit them few days within the job being completed but there's 1-2 vendors we no longer use that are sending us invoice bills from March of this year. The main issue is a few of these bills are for properties/ owners we no longer manage for. Usually after a job is complete if I haven't received anything within a week or two I call and see what's going on and usually get no clear answer (hence why we don't use them anymore). Just am curious if this is vendors fault for submitting them five months later or the best way to handle this.