I have a five-year tenant who is requesting me to repaint the living room, stairwell, and an upstairs hallway. They've been decent tenants, paying on time and taking reasonably good care of the property. Would you do it for them?

Stairwell and hallway shouldn't be as big a problem, as no furniture. But, just a good wash 'might' just refresh the spaces. I WOULD help a tenant wash spaces; they don't have stepladders, tall ladders, and if you've ever had those streaks of dirty water run down walls, you know you wash bottom up.

Busy - I wash walls in thirds - top all the way across, middle, then bottom. Wouldn’t bottom up have streaks of dirty water dripping over the clean bottom from above? My bottoms are usually dirtier.

Still learning, maybe I have it upside down. ( stupid spatial relations issues!) My houses have all been occupied for so long, I mostly do 'spot' washing, lol!

I admit, I do a web search before doing any project that involves up, down, this way that way, cuz I mix those down ( see what i did there? groan...)

We would. It is our business model to keep desirable Residents as long as we can and us offering an upgrade might keep them for another year.

We offer Residents a choice of those types of upgrades as an anniversary gift. We give the list of upgrade options along with the notice of the rent increase.

Spring is in the air and I learned from Jeffrey's book The Landlord's Kit, that Residents yearn for something fresh and new this time of year.

I would carefully set expectations. When we paint, if the room is smallish like a junior bedroom, we tell Residents all furniture needs to be gone from the room, not just pushed into the middle of the room and covered. We also say it will take 1 day longer than we think it will take so we can finish ahead of schedule.

When we replaced flooring in one home, although we told the Residents it would be 5 days (remove carpet, pad, tack strips, install flooring, paint baseboards and install baseboards, caulk baseboards, and touch up paint baseboards) they didn't believe us and were upset after 2 days. Now we detail out all the steps and repeat the time line often.

We have a now-ten-year tenant who wanted the place painted a few years ago. Of course he wanted to do it and quoted us a painter's price. We checked out the walls and they were bloody PERFECT so we declined and said we never allow tenants to paint their own place because then everyone in the building would be asking - and it is NOT in the budget and most people can't paint anyway.

Have you gone and looked at the paint? Is the paint shot?

Unless the paint is a lot older than the five years, it should be fine, or maybe it needs to be washed. A light scrubbing and a magic eraser will make most paint look brand new again.

bUSY wi I've left maybe 6 gallons over the years. When these tenants leave I get 6 gallons back-- without exception. UNOPENED.

Robin,

I would paint it.

Stairwells can be very difficult so maybe negotiate that off the list.

Is the need for paint due to child artwork on the walls - charge for it.

This is a huge departure…labor shortage AND good res shortage…I have allowed a few long term renters to paint. ESP if we had not painted at their move in. I supply the neutral color paint, drops, lie tape, and they sign an agreement to pay for any drips.

BTW I going LIGHT GRIEGE on walls with white trim.

Well Brad, at least you are going light greige, lol! I have always used a light greige ( hmmm... I think its close to SW Popular gray, ifI recall.) Anyway, I have changed brands three times, and have yet to have touch-ups not match.

I used to stack five gallon buckets in the stairs to I could change bulbs or paint. I never let the tenants do it. They are responsible for the rest of the place.

Then one Black Friday I saw a deal on a nice adjustable ladder. I fell in love after the first use. What an idiot for doing it so unsafely all those years.

Oh I also change the fixtures in the stairwell with LED units as needed. Have yet to need to replace one. Still a little chicken to start swapping them out throughout the entire place. Changing a bulb is on the T, replacing a fixture is not.

Back to paint. I try not to paint during tenancy. Had a couple that I inherited when I bought a place. The last owner would drop off a pail and they would paint every spring. This worked for a couple years with me and then one of them knocked the pail over at the top of the stairs, freaked out and ran thru the paint, down the stairs, thru the apartment and outside to get to the next apartment.

I tell them that we can allow them to hire a painting contractor and IF we approve the color from Sherwin Williams or Behn company.. We need the name of the contractor and the color of the paint before hand.

Chances are very low that you will hear from them on the matter

When washing walls, the proper way is to wash bottom up. Yes, some may drip from above when you are washing above the bottom. But that is easily wiped off. If you wash from the top down, the streaks that drip lower don't usually come off well if at all.

Back in 2002, I had a Section 8 Tenant in West Hollywood who demanded I repaint their entire apartment again. Before they moved in, Section 8 Family, their case worker wouldn't release funds or sign a lease unless I painted the unit, using hi-grade paint and licensed painters. I had a Beverly Hills job done on a West Hollywood apartment.

Then less then a year and a half later I got the same request, repaint their entire unit! I flat-out refused. Then Section 8 stopped paying rent and ordered me to re-paint their unit.

I filed an eviction case against the tenants and a small claims law suit against Section 8 (the State) and the City of West Hollywood.

I was sent to the Beverly Hills courts who handle West Hollywood. I refused a judge pro tem or a commissioner, only a real seasoned judge.

After 30 minutes of lies and BS from everyone, I got to speak. The judge was willing to impose a $1000 fine for anyone who interrupts me.

I had a West Hollywood Detective testify that the reason why the tenants demanded their apartment be re-painted was their kids had fingerprints all over the walls. The court was in a uproar and the Judge refused to find anyone for interrupting. The court, Section 8 and all said so what? I then got another Judge up to testify. You see in West Hollywood, under their Section 8 guide lines, the only things a tenant is required to do is Clean off finger prints from the walls.

I had given these tenants Fantastic Wall spray and rolls of paper towels to clean the walls. They refused and demanded I re paint.

SO I won the case, got a judgment against Section 8 for not paying rent. The tenant for not paying their portion. And the City/State for playing with me and not following the rules.

Yeah, the footprints stayed on the sidewalk longer than they should have. It was more to remind the other Ts why I don't let them paint.

As long as the tenants are still keepers, I would consider it. Both sides will have to cooperate with one another to make it work though.