The key is always to have leverage and pay upon completion of agreed upon milestone such as end of demolition, upon successfully passing of rough inspection, upon kitchen installation, upon successful passing of final inspection, upon completion of final walk through and touch up list.You should specify these milestone in the contract under "payment schedule" so there are no surprises.Always keep a significant amount 20-30% as a final payment upon completion of final touch up list.

Another way to handle a tenant that is desperate to move-in is to do a rough clean of their apartment and then come back in a few days to do any deferred items (like drywall, touch up painting, etc) I'm actually doing that today.

We do plan to have a painter come back to do touch ups.  

We stopped by the property around 9pm last night to make sure things were locked up, and he was there by himself doing some touch up painting and appeared to be high on drugs (and offered us a beer).He is still insistent we'll close everything out next week on schedule, but I have serious reservations.

This is the first time we encountered where the drive way is so beyond touch up repair.

It shouldn't take much to touch up the baseboards.

Communication around the turn over was excellent and the move out report and repair estimate was in line with a move out with only minor paint touch up/lawn maintenance/rekey/etc type expenses. 

You can go back with a brush and touch up the edges when you're done.As far as how long a paint job lasts, I've never painted the outside of the same house twice.

I took one day to change the locks and touch up a few things (the place was near spotless when they left) and my new tenants started that week.

I use a flat base paint so if i go back and touch up paint you cant tell where it was. that way when tennants move out i dont have to paint the entire place.