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General Landlording & Rental Properties

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John Hodson
  • Rental Property Investor
  • Montrose, CA
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Should Tenant Pay for Landscaping If They Want It For My SFH?

John Hodson
  • Rental Property Investor
  • Montrose, CA
Posted Jun 6 2016, 21:10

Hi All BPers!

I need some guidance. My tenant wants to level the backyard before the annual weed and feed. Below are pictures of the yard. It is uneven as you can see. They wanted to rent a tiller at first which I questioned having them dig up the yard. What I asked my PM to do was get an estimate for what landscaping would cost. PM came back with about $2400 for the back yard (2400 sq.ft) which includes 1) Removal of seven stumps in preparation for reseeding of yard, 2) Scotts starter fertilizer, 3) Pennington grass seed, 4) 3 yds topsoil. They also got an estimate for the front yard at the tenant's request. That is approximately $1200 to till, grade, and re-seed the front yard due to it being 60% covered in weeds. That sounds like too much for me to spend right now.

In addition, there is a clause in the tenant lease which states "Tenant shall conduct routine landscaping of the Premises, including regular mowing of the grass, removal of leaves and small fallen branches, regular removal of all weeds and grasses in landscaped areas and trimming of plantings, including shrubs, unless otherwise provided by the Owner or a third party such as a homeowners association."

Should I ask that the tenant pay for all this if they want it? Does the yard look in that bad of shape? On a side note, the yard in the place that I rent from now is not much better than my rental property shown here. What are your standards for lawn maintenance and how would you handle this? Thank you!

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