Advise needed - Tenant says its too hot in summer

I would not do anything now at the end of summer. The lease comes up in Spring next year. That would be the time to tackle it. They may or may not stay. However money wise it might be silly to lose a tenant if the cost of cooling was the same as letting fee. But the numbers need to work.

So don't do it "just to be nice" and don't refuse it just to be hard headed. The numbers should give the correct path to follow.
 
to give an alternative view, as a tennant myself...

The place my girlfriend and I currently rent is a 2 storey duplex, 3bed/2bath... nice place, and we were very happy with it for about 2 months.

Then winter hit, and we FROZE.
I mean, literally, temps inside the house occasionally went below zero.
We rugged up, used some environmentally unfriendly oil heaters, and made it thru the winter.

Then spring/summer hit... and we COOKED. Upstairs of the house was just unbearable.
Nothing we could do about it - being a duplex it gets buggerall ventillation.


The house has no heating, and no cooling. Nothing.
Needless to say, we are moving out at the end of our lease (May).
So the landlord is losing us as good tennants, and can go back to the bad types he's had before (major damage in house from previous tennants).


By contrast we put aircon into our townhouse before we moved out and put it up for rent, and its getting us an extra $5/wk rent, and has kept our fantastic tennant very happy (he just signed for another 6 months).

Making tennants comfortable to me makes it easier to keep a good tennant.
 
sparky23 said:
Is it worth doing anything at all for one week of hot weather per year? LOL
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1 week of heat per year ? Where do you live Tasmania ?


I'd decide if it worth doing anything

If it is, then look aover the palve & work out what would be suitable (e.g. a sail might not be able to be installed where required etc) & the costs...

remember the tenant hasn't asked for anything so no guarantee they will be happy paying extra for it.
 
Aimjoy said:
This had me in stitches for ages - love it! You are such a b*@tard Dazz :)

Then again I was thinking 50c - I get calls for 25c - maybe you are being overly generous. They could make 2 calls for that!

CYA
Aimjoy
Click to expand...

Maybe Dazz still uses the old style phones and WA is much further away so costs more LOL ;)
 
Witzl;386540The house has no heating said:
I wonder if you have asked the landlord to install cooling/heating. Maybe he would be interested in doing so for a slight increase in your rent.

We once installed aircon for a long term tenant who actually asked if they could install a window box and take it with them but fix the window up. We trusted them implicitly to do as they said, but we decided to install a split system to make it easier to rent next time. We didn't put their rent up because they were good enough to allow us to build a deck on the back while they lived there and they were great tenants who were looking to buy, so we knew we would be putting the house up for rent sooner rather than later and waited until then to up the rent.

In other cases, we have waited until a tenancy is about to finish, and tenants about to leave and then installed air-con or a dishwasher. Each of these things gets more rent, or makes renting easier, so they pay for themselves very quickly via higher rent.

Witzl, if you have asked for heating/cooling and the landlord has refused, then they are probably biting off their noses to spite their face, because the problem will not go away.
Click to expand...
 
Wylie - as a landlord, i totally agree with you that doing those small improvements pay for themselves in both higher rent and lower vacancies between tennants.

We were going to ask him... but we just dont like the house anymore. We want a freestanding house, not a duplex... plus the carpets and walls are all ruined from the previous tennants and their dog, which embarasses us when we have friends over.
ON top of that, he rejected a request to keep our two cats, despite the fact that the house has been totally ripped up by the previous tennants and their dog(s).
I thought that was a little rich.


Back on topic - My point as a tennant was that by not having that small creature comfort (aircon), it has made us want to move out - so as a landlord is worth doing if you have a good tennant youo want to keep.
 
Thanks for all the input guys. I guess since the tenants havent actually directly asked for it yet, it was just a comment on the inspection report, I might just let this one go for a bit. After all, summer is now over, so I may reassess the situation closer to the end of the lease before summer comes in again.
 
Send the PM over to the property with a copy of the latest Harvey Norman catalogue, with a picture of any one of the 50 million fans they sell, highlighted with a big red circle drawn around it.

Make sure you highlight a good value one that the tenant can afford, or maybe go for the you-beaut version that they can get on the 24 month interest free deal.

If you're feeling generous, you could do a mapquest print-out and attach it to the catalogue as well so the tenant can find their way to the nearest branch easily. ;)
 
Suggest to the tenant to install their own under the provision they leave it behind when they vacate. Not as stupid as it sounds. I have a tenant who wants to install a gas bench top cooker under those conditons :)
 
An opportunity to raise the rent and keep the tenant happy? :)

You may find that it pays for itself +

A scumlord may even suggest a split system without an inverter, costs the tenant more in electricity and they can't afford to leave :D:D
 
We had an unusual situation recently when the tenant asked that if they paid for a split system air-con unit, but we paid for the installation, they would leave the unit behind when they move in the future.

I got the PM to get this in writing and then gave the okay, ..... it cost us $700 installation cost, but we now have an asset that increases the property value and improves future rent returns.

I suppose it also means that we have a tenant that wants to stay long term, ..... bonus !!

Martin .... :p
 
OMG how could anyone find it hot in Melbourne!!! I live in Brissy and don't even think it's hot up here. Fans work perfectly well.

I'm with Daz et al on this - tell him to harden up and get used to it.
 
I'd be telling them nothing.

No one made a request for anything......

so there is no one waiting for a reply to anything... Why answer an unasked question & open an avoidable can of worms ?

The tenant just made a comment, like "gees the roads are busy today"... if the person that was said to worked for Main Roads, does that change it from a comment to a complaint & request ?

ItDOES get hot in Australia, even Melbourne, otherwise, no none would have an air con, and some houses are hotter to live in than others (it happens!) so there's no benefit I can see in belittling the tenant by saying what he is saying is wrong (as I said, no benefit I can see in belittling the tenant, maybe ther is a benefit I don't see (?))
 
Hasn't this Brisbane summer been just fantastic, not too hot, just right.

I have just come home from sitting for four hours at a soccer field at Tingalpa and it was too cold to get out of the car..... in early March :eek:

I took a jacket with me to have a coffee after the movies the other night..... in early March :eek:

I wish every summer was like this. We have only had the air-con turned on about two or three days this summer. I LOVE it.
 
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