Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Renter issues

[Christine Johnson (cbmanz]

While I am not (yet) a cohousing resident, I am a long time landlord.   
 I would have a professional cleaning service come in, if the deposit 
is sufficient, and ask them to deodorize the unit.  Suggest that you 
carefully itemize, in writing, each charge against the deposit for all 
the repairs & cleaning and refund the balance, if any, by mail along 
with the list of itemized charges.  Keep a copy on file for yourself.   
In Texas, tenants are required by law to provide a forwarding address 
and that may be the case where you are as well.

Your neighbors, relatives of your tenant, are not responsible for 
his/her negligence and it is unfortunate that they prevailed upon your 
friendship to persuade you to lease to him/her.   As far as mending 
your relationship with your neighbors, can only suggest that you sit 
down and explain to them what transpired and express your wish that all 
this not hurt your friendship.  You know, they may be embarassed by all 
this and would welcome your explanation.

W/respect to leasing to friends and relatives, and relatives of 
friends, we simply do not do it.   The landlord-tenant relationship is 
simply too fragile to risk losing a friend or happy relationship w/a 
family member to disagreements over contractual obligations.   Hope the 
next tenant is conscientious and this experience can be put behind you 
as "educational cost."

Christine Johnson
Bastrop, Texas

 WOLF1GDSFM [at] aol.com wrote:
> A recent renter left the apartment for hours with windows wide open
> when bad weather was predicted, cleaned his/her catbox so seldom that
> the whole unit (including my part) smelled bad, let her/his cats make
> holes in the screens, wanted out of the lease months early (gladly
> granted), left the stove, counters, sink and bathroom fixtures dirty, 
> left
> various non-valuable possessions behind and didn't return the unit or
> mailbox keys.  The apartment still smells of catbox.  I have not yet
> returned the damage deposit.
>
> I am puzzling over how much of the deposit to return to this person.  
> If I
> return too little, there may be a problem, since the former renter is a
> close relative of neighbor family.  Said neighbors have been rather
> unhelpful in dealing with this relative, even though those neighbors'
> advocacy was the reason I rented to this person in the first place.  
> The
> situation has strained relations between myself and those neighbors.  I
> have not been able to talk of my difficulties with other neighbors 
> without
> feeling like a gossip.  The whole situation has left me reluctant to 
> try
> renting again, although I may not be able to afford to stay here if I 
> do
> not.
>
> Are there suggestions for dealing with any of the issues in the above
> scenario?
>
> J.
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