One reason to reject someone with too many animals is budget. It's not in their budget to care for those animals! They don't know it yet, but it's true.

We have two cats. Both neutered, both lovely loving cats to everyone but each other. They fight and squabble and we recently just had our (4th?) vet visit in the past year for one of them, another abscess on his face from a bite from the other one. $200 later he is happy and pain-free...

He's a CAT. $200 15 minute vet visit. Operation, antibiotics, pain meds.

All of you who have pets KNOW they are cheap to get, relatively cheap to feed but EXPENSIVE to care for properly...

Just sayin'

Yes, expensive to feed and care for. Vets charge serious money for even routine care, let alone emergency care.

I don't get a lot of bad move-outs, but every one of them was with tenants who owned nondescript mongrels. I've bought one that was trashed and the tenants in it owned some ugly mongrels.

I wonder if there is some sort of correlation that can be made?

Get out the Blue light.

Most are eating, licking, stinky, #2 machines.

Where I live, the vets have some of the most reasonable rates in the country. In general, none of them accept pet insurance, but they keep their costs low.

Still, yes. Pets cost money.

I spent nearly $150 today for an annual dog visit. This included a well animal check (which was super fast), one dose of Heartgard, a Rx for the generic to take to Sam's Club to get 12 more (half the price of the vet), a heartworm test, Rabies vaccine, distemper vaccine.

He will get two more vaccines in June (Lepto and Bordatello).

When he got sick in December/early January, we spent about $400 on him in two visits plus some meds.

That doesn't include the food, gear, etc.

When it's time to assess an application, many of us use a number of 3.5 to 4 times the rent amount as a minimum we will accept to qualify. The banks that lend the money to buy a place use their own formulas for homes people buy.It used to be house payment no more than 25 percent of wages and total debt payments no more than 42 percent or so.

Over the past few years these numbers have gone up. Trouble is, people's wages have not increased proportionally. So, using these numbers, especially on Class C and D properties can often create problems.

When I made $3.50 an hour, rent was $85 a month. Used cars could be bought for $50 ( I had many I bought at that price). Gas was 25 cents a gallon.

Now my Tenants make $7.25 to $12 an hour. That's about 2 to 3.5 times the wages from then.

However, even the cheapest Class C place is $500.(6 times the old days) A used car is CHEAP if you can find one for $1000 (20 times the price). Gas is $2.69 today (10 times the price)Most everything else is up by the same levels.

It's obvious there's a big disparity. Realistically, the tenants would need a wage of about 10 times the old level ($35 an hour)just to keep even. They don't have it.

Many of them use 1.5 weeks pay or more for a place and struggle because all those other costs are Up too.

If it was realistic, I'd figure like this instead of just using the 3.5x rent formula.

Rent+ car payment+ gas+ repair allowance+ health insurance payment+ cigs at $210 a month for a pack a day for each smoker+$80 a month for each animal's food and vet allowance could not be more than 50 percent of take home pay.

WMH, just a thought, when one of our beagles started getting cranky towards the other one, had a quick scuffle, and one ear was badly ripped ($400 surgery). We had the vet check for other health issues. The crabbiness had been increasing slowly for a while. Anyway, turns out our girl was in pain from a good bit of arthritis. Glucosamine and chondroitin is taking care of it, though at first the vet had her on a dose of pain meds till the G&C started having effect.

I was a cat servant for a number of years. They weren't actually my cats, they were my next door neighbors, but they mostly lived at my house because I served them Trader Joes canned salmon on a crystal platter. So they loved me, but hated my neighbor because HE was the one who took them to the vet. I had to wear a leather jacket and welding gloves to get one of them into the box on vet day. LOL :)

One day I heard a hellacious noise outside, ran out to see this lady with her dog on about a 20 foot leash clear up in my entry with the cat cornered by the gate all arched and screaming at the dog. Then like a blur the other (a pure white Siamese) came racing along the fence and launched itself onto the back of the dog, digging it's teeth into it's neck. When we finally got it off there was like viscera hanging off the dog's neck!

I was like, "That's not MY cat, it's HIS cat!" I'm sure she had a thousand dollar vet bill. LOL

I still have their pictures on our fridge. :)

There is no such thing as a free pet.

We had a "mutt" when I was a kid, a purebred standard poodle got loose and mated with a labrador retriever. Free for the picking!