Chandler Properties Blog

Overview 

I recently had an elderly tenant move out of my duplex and into a nursing home.  This is the first time I’ve been in that unit in three years.  The tenant suffered from dementia and I spent about the last year trying to get her family to get her into a nursing home.  She had disassociated herself from all her family, because she believed everyone was trying to steal from her.  Well they finally got her into a nursing home 2 weeks ago. 

The Smell

I had noticed the last 6 months or so that when I picked up rent that there was a strong smell of urine coming from the apartment.  My assumption was that it was due to lack of cleanliness or soiled diapers.  After getting the apartment cleaned out, (This is a whole story in itself.) I noticed the smell was still in the apartment.  It turned out that water heater had been slowly leaking for about a year.  The kitchen floor on the apartment is particle board.  When particle board gets soaking wet it breaks down causing a chemical reaction that gives off an odor-like smell.  It also expands and breaks down losing strength.  Since the leak had been going on for some time it has spread throughout most of the kitchen floor.  This is a good lesson for any landlord to recognize the signs of wet particle board.

Solution

To solve the problem I’m going to have to replace the entire kitchen floor.  This means the kitchen counters, new water heater, stove, refrigerator all have to be removed so that the floor can be replaced.  I will also have to put down new linoleum.  I’ve had a couple contractors come by and quote the job.  I’m thinking it’s going to be about $1,200 to get it all replaced.

The Lesson Learned

If I ever smell a “urine like” smell coming from one of my apartments I am going to be sure to immediately check it for leaks.  Since I did not take immediate action, it is going to take more effort and money to fix the problem.

Spring is in the air and tenants have finally started renting again.  Two weeks ago I rented my Sharon Drive apartment which had sat empty for over five months.  Having a unit open for that long was unnerving and I was beginning to wonder if it would ever rent.  I have never had a property sit empty that long in seven years of owning rentals.  Renting in winter time is always difficult, but with the downturn in the economy this time was exceptionally difficult.  I had several interested prospects, but most did not qualify either because of bad credit or bad rental history.  As much as it hurt to be without rent for five months I was not about ease up on my tenant standards.  It’s a lot easier to get a bad tenant into an apartment than to get them out.  

I was please to get a young couple in the apartment the other week.  They had good credit and excellent personal references.  I did have to drop the rent from the original $465 to $415, but I think the decrease in rent is just part of the recession.  It’s great to be getting rent on the unit and not having to pay the utility bill.

The lessons learned from this experience are:

1) Build into financial projections the potential of having a property sit vacant for an extended period of time.  Make sure I always have enough cash to cover these types of events.

2) Don’t let up on my rental standards.  Eventually a good tenant will come along and a little lost rent is better than the cost and hassle of trying to evict a bad tenant.

I’d be interested to know if any of you out there experienced a rough winter with vacancies and have noticed a pick up in rentals this spring.  If you have feel free to post a comment.