All Forum Posts by: Cathy B.

Am I the only one using Zillow?  The ACH feature is free for both landlord and tenants.  You can pay to expedite the transfer if you want.
Only complaint is that its a one way payment system.  You can't provide credits to the tenants.

A police report may be something the insurer will want to see if you go down that route.  Just a thought.

Thanks everyone for your input.  Lots of different perspectives to think about!

Quote from @Andrew B.:

If you know the handle on the dishwasher is known to break, then that's reasonable wear and tear as long as its not brand new. The defining question you need to ask is, "did this break during normal and reasonable use or did it break because of abuse or misuse." Things like handles tend to break when being used over and over for long periods of time. It's just the nature of rentals that you pay for that stuff. I could not ethically charge a tenant for something that I was willing to admit has a design flaw, making it more likely to break. The fridge handle may be a little more grey, since it isn't a flawed design that we know of, but it is still a cheap plastic handle at the end of the day. It will eventually break when being used daily. I would lean toward calling this reasonable wear and tear also. If you dig hard enough online, you can probably find a replacement handle that is unbranded or a slightly different handle from a similar model that will still fit. 

I wouldn't charge tenant for either of these repairs.

Andrew,  Not a cheap plastic handle on the refrigerator/freezer drawer.  Its a heavy duty metal that snapped . . . likely someone dropped a large item from the refrigerator above and hence the gash on one side of the handle (also a new cosmetic development).  The force of this probably broke the whole thing on both sides.  Wish I could find a replacement, but it seems to be an unusual model.

Also, I'm not saying there is a definite design flaw on the dishwasher, just that a repair video indicated that they thought it was.  The manufacturer does not seem to admit it from what I can tell.  Noted what you say about wear and tear on this.  I'll likely point it out in the final walk through and see what the reaction/story is.

Hello,

I am a landlord to 1 single family property and I'm now trying to figure out how to handle some possible tenant misuse of some appliances. The appliances are in good working order except for these damaged pieces.

1) I have a dishdrawer dishwasher (which means two separate independent drawers) and one of the handles is now broken. I saw a youtube video from an appliance repair person that indicated that the earlier models had a design flaw in which the handles would break at the plastic connection. Replacement parts were redesigned and do not have this flaw. However, the manufacturer does not seem to admit to the flaw and handles can only be ordered in pairs. So, can I charge the tenant for breaking the handle? (taken out of deposit, of course) If so, do I charge them for one handle, or two?

2) I have a refrigerator/freezer with a bottom drawer in the handle is broken near both of the connections and is now loose. From the scrape on one side of it, I assume that someone dropped a large object on it and it snapped. The appliance manufacturer no longer offers a replacement part. My plan is to repair the broken connection with JB weld and tighten up the screws, maybe re-coat with some silver paint. I assume I can take the cost of the materials out of their deposit. Is this how you would normal approach this kind of thing?

Pics attached for reference.

Any advice is appreciated!

-Cathy