All Forum Posts by: Mark A.

DO NOT let them start you down this road!!!  They did not have a problem when they signed the lease and usually when we are meeting to sign a lease the tenants are wondering through the house figuring where to put furniture.  These tenants sound like a potential nightmare waiting happen at your expense.  Consider giving them their money back with an admin fee to keep! Good luck

@Mark A. this is not an unusual situation. I manage over 200 units and we sometimes miss stuff during the cleaning process.

What I recommend is that you apologize for not getting it in tip-top shape and offer to knock a little off their rent. In my area, a cleaner would cost $20 - $25 an hour and should be able to dust and mop in just a few hours. An offer of $50 would be fair and an offer of $100 would be generous. Go with your gut and treat them the way you would want to be treated.

I ask my tenants to report any problems immediately so I can remedy the problem. They rarely do. When I offer to make it right, they generally reject the offer. They mostly want to be heard and want me to know they will be good tenants and take care of things. That's a great time to send them a Starbucks card or something as a thank-you.

When tenants rush me, I make it very clear that the unit may not be up to the highest standard of cleanliness and they will have to accept it. When I tell them this up front, they are much better prepared and forgiving.

Moving can be very stressful and your tenants are probably just high-strung. Treat them well and give them some time to calm down and it should work out.

One option would be to provide a gift certificate of some kind.  So it's not acknowledging that the unit was dirty, but that you appreciate them as a new tenant.

if you go in now and clean the tenant will have accomplished the first step in training the landlord's.  

@Mark A. Gotcha.  Given that, you can either hire a cleaner to quickly address the situation (if you do that, make sure to have it noted that your tenant agrees to this solution and you get their completion acknowledgement), or you can take the hard-line of saying they have already signed and taken possession of the unit.  Personally, I think hiring a cleaner would be the easier route and is a minor expense in the grand scheme of things.  Also, it will promote better relations with the tenant in the long run.  Hope it all works out for you! 

I find a hurried turn-around actually takes longer and costs more in the end. And the post mentions it was "as thorough job as we could" and sounds like you may have been under some time pressure.

There is a good lesson that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure (i.e., doing everything before they move in). 

Now, what to do--if the tenant is being reasonable and accurate--you may have some call back work to do. You have to be  the "make ready" man after the move-in (which can always add an extra step of working around the tenant and their stuff)...

First, I like your photo and documentation idea as a first step. 

I would look at taking the abstract "not ready" complaint down to a more precise punch list compiled by you and the tenant. 

If the items are reasonable (clean this, replace that, fix that), I would probably carry through on it to retain the tenant and try and do-over on-boarding. If the tenant is being unreasonable, I may look at offering a mutual lease termination.

Bigger picture, it may be an opportunity to look at your turn around procedure, tenant on-boarding or maybe even tenant selection if you got an unreasonable one...

Best of luck!

Y O U should have taken the pictures and had the tenant sign a Move-In check list (see TOOLS menu->

https://www.biggerpockets.com/files/user/JOBEARD/file/move-in-and-out-chklist

)

Give them the name and number of a cleaning service.

Did you do a walk through with the client before then signed the lease agreement?  It's not a requirement in many states, but it sure is a good way for you to receive documented acknowledgement of delivery by the tenant as well as providing a baseline to assess any possible deductions on their good-faith deposit upon their exit.