A)We will leave the home as is and rent will remain the same as it has been for the duration of your stay.B)We would propose to re-carpet the entire home and repaint all interior walls (not ceilings) and we would increase the rent to XXXX.

PS: It's easier to get fooled when a tenant has been good for as long as a year; I just had tenants of 5 1/2 years' duration who never gave me a problem turn against me completely when I told them I was selling the house in order to move across country; long story, different forum, but it got very nasty.

Yes with the possible exception for the duration of the tenant although some companies do this2.

It can be a lot worse if nothing has been done on it and you have to wait the entire duration."

He also said that the rental guarantee of $1300/mo was good for at least one year, but if that first tenant stayed for longer than the year, then the rental guarantee would still pay the difference for the entire duration of the first tenant.

He was not sure about duration of that holding period but I think that it should be any financial year.

Check the forums on the topic - basically shop for rates and max duration.

Karen F, This sounds like the right approach and avoids subletting issue for such short duration at end of lease. 

They will usually draft a term sheet, with all of their costs broken down, interest rate, loan duration etc.From this you can plug and chug into either a BP calculator or property analysis report of your choosing and see if the numbers fit.

Interest rates, points, LTV, repayment terms, and durations, for example, are all over the map.