I agree, but you have to be careful. If you choose the "easy" every time, the potential exists for you to be sued for discrimination since "disability" is one of the seven protected classes. And it certainly isn't easy to tell immediately who is easy to get along with. I'm all for allowing REAL service or therapy animals, as I said, as soon as I state my requirements they go "poof". Problem solved.
ETA--Forgot you are in British Columbia, different rules apply to you!
Allow non dangerous breeds. Charge extra and demand insurance. Love- and drug-, apologies, cigarette/vape “addicts” (fans) will pay for their “freedom”.
Good point @Will Gaston regarding tenants lying about having pets. Curious to know how common this is and if anyone else has experienced this.
We allow pets on our properties because everyone has a dog or cat in our market and if we didn’t allow them, we’d have a lot more vacancies. We charge a $25 / mo pet “fee” and tenants sign a pet addendum. You have to be careful how you present it as some states don’t allow you to refer to it as pet “rent”. We’re also considering requiring tenants to carry pet insurance. Anyone else do this? What’s your experience?
No, I don’t allow pets - I inherited the policy from my parents who mostly felt with buildings but after evicting the last set of tenants I inherited I will continue it... in the end the hardwood floors were so badley stained I couldn’t recover them and had to install laminate, the interior doors were destroyed from scratching and the access hatch to the crawl space required replacement as well... bottom line, they were not good tenants, even so the security deposit barley covers the damage...
At the end of the day, what is the likely hood that damage will occur and that you can recover the damage?
Good point @Will Gaston regarding tenants lying about having pets. Curious to know how common this is and if anyone else has experienced this.
We allow pets on our properties because everyone has a dog or cat in our market and if we didn’t allow them, we’d have a lot more vacancies. We charge a $25 / mo pet “fee” and tenants sign a pet addendum. You have to be careful how you present it as some states don’t allow you to refer to it as pet “rent”. We’re also considering requiring tenants to carry pet insurance. Anyone else do this? What’s your experience?
We check the property every six months while changing the furnace filter. Have discovered two "new" pets this way in 8 years. Of course both claimed "ignorance" of the fact that they couldn't do that, despite it being in the lease and my verbally saying it. Both times wrote a five day notice, both times in 5 days they had proof that the animal was fixed, had shots, signed a pet addendum, and paid the extra deposit. The one with a dog said she couldn't afford it, I admit to going off on her and saying she shouldn't have a dog if she couldn't get its shots, etc. She came through within the five days.
Did have one nightmare scenario that goes along with the "you can't tell who is easy to get along with" rule. Rented tiny (520) sf. place to a woman my age who I really liked. She promptly moved in her son, his girlfriend, and a pit bull which they were letting out the door to run free. (30# weight limit per the association.) This property is next to a river with a path, very popular with people and their dogs. I was clueless, of course, until the police called me. Pit bull attacked a cocker spaniel AND its owner on the path. Cocker spaniel's owner opened pit bull's head with a rock she grabbed, it ran off. Police came and shot the still -running -loose pit bull. Neighbors told the police who owned the pit bull. Tenants hid in the condo and pretended they weren't home, which is how I came to be informed, as the association had been called and they gave the police my number. At this point she had just paid her second month's rent. It was April 7. Cocker spaniel was treated by my vet because my vet happens to be 1/2 mile away from this property. My husband and I went over that night, they were still hiding, we used our keys to get in. We basically said "Be out in 24 hours or we are suing you, the cocker spaniel's owner is suing you, the association is suing you". (Which was all BS on our part but we were very angry.) They were out in less than 24 hours. The vet bill was $700, the human's ER bill was only $350 (she got bitten on the ankle but not deeply). I had it re-rented on April 18, I kept all of her rent for April and her deposit so came out ahead about $300. She later tried to trash my reputation online but I posted the police report and she took down her post. All of that to say I still allow dogs...it's liars I don't like!
I would love to disallow pets completely, but we allow pets under a certain size/weight. We realize that small pets can still cause damage, but our biggest concern is large dogs destroying our floors. We didn't use the best material because we thought we were selling the house. That being said, we recognized that in our market, disallowing pets completely would turn away some great potential tenants. And you can get pet fees and higher rents if you allow pets. But whatever you choose, stick to your guns. When I was renting out my first house, I was too nice. I'd chat with people who straight up told me their dogs were over our limits, told one couple they could just pay one lump fee instead of a per-pet fee, and was a total pushover. Fortunately, the woman we leased to doesn't have a pet, but looking back, I'm annoyed with myself for not sticking to my policies.
Waterproof flooring has come a long way. Luxury Vinyl Plank, WPC, SPC flooring is a great alternative to having to invest in an expensive tile floor installation. It comes in wood looks and stone looks. Installing the glue down version takes a little more expertise... But the floating/click lock version can usually be installed by a "do-it-yourselfer" or a handy man as long as the subfloor doesn't have major imperfections.
We take pets in our rental units as well as our vacation rental units
For our long term rental units we charge a one time non refundable pet fee of $300 and have them also sign a Pet addendum for any damage .
For Vacation Rentals we charge a one time non refundable pet fee of $75 per pet up to 1 month stay longer than 1 month stay we add another $75 , we also limit pets to under 50 lbs and we do not allow cats in vacation rentals.
How do you cover the damage to the yard? One or two large dogs can have paths in the sod in a very short time. I just installed sod in a clients yard and her two small terrier (terror) type have it with more yellow dead spots than green.
Resodding even a small yard can be more expensive than is covered in a deposit, especially if there are other things to come out of that deposit.
@Redgy Saint-Germain Only small animals like dogs and cats in accordance with the rules of the mobile home communities I do business in. Believe it or not, some even have a weight limit!!