Missed appraiser fee - who should pay

[David Korchak]

Hey BP community 

I have a situation, that I need advice on. 

We are doing a cash out refinance on a property and our property manager scheduled an appraiser visit with the tenant who choose the date and time for the appraisal. When the appraiser arrived there was nobody in the property to let him/her in. Obviously now the lender is charging me the missed appointment fee and since this is a second time that appointment was missed I let my property management company know that I am expected to be compensated for this charge. They agreed and said will charge it to the tenant. 

I have my doubts about if this is the right thing to do. In my opinion the property management should have sent their agent to the property on the time of the appointment to make sure appraiser will go in (since they have already had one missed appointment the second time they should know better) they did not, and now they want to charge the tenant. On the other hand the tenant was the one who picked the time and the date and if he/she is not responsible enough (for the second time) to make it, maybe they should be one paying. 

Anyways, any advise is welcome

Thanks 

David

[Drew Sygit]

@David Korchak MANY owners do not understand that paying a monthly management fee does NOT make a PMC your go'fer!

Yes, fully understand that it's convenient for owners to expect this, but again, if it's not covered in the management contract it doesn't have to be done - for free.

Since you've NOW disclosed that you already paid the first reinspection fee after the tenant missed the appointment, that slightly changes the perspective.

This happens more often than owners want to understand. 

To address it, we set the 3 reminders we previously mentioned for the FIRST appointment. If the tenant misses that appointment, we charge them for it, but then send staff to the next appointment to avoid another blown appointment. We would also warn the tenant, in writing (legal entry notice), that if they are not there, we will enter anyways. We will also get the owner's approval for our fee to send staff.

The only challenge with sending staff for access, is if the tenant leaves an unattended minor in the home, has a vicious dog or whatever occupant is there becomes hostile. Then the police may have to be involved for legal entry.

This is an example of why PMC's chuckle every time an owner posts, why hire a PMC when managing is so EASY!