What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Washington - Clallam County
We had a very eventful walk through over the weekend at our Single Family Home. The tenants attempted to aggressively snatch the walk through paper work from our hands and made physical contact in the process. They demanded to have their check on the spot and that "Nothing was wrong with the house." We had to leave the premises and get away from their verbal assaults and attempts at blocking our route to the car. The male Tenant then chased after us and found us parked on a side street not on the route to leave the Premises. He then turned toward us and went the wrong way down a one way street with his window down and driving aggressively fast to come up alongside where we had parked. We took off in our car for fear he had a gun and he proceeded to whip around chase us for about a mile and right off our bumper before realizing we were on the phone with the Police and requesting help. Note we have the entire altercation on video and tape recorder.
We had done the walk through earlier in the morning as we knew one could not be conducted with such volatile tenants. (This was not the first time they had escalated in verbal assaults and threats but this was the first time that physical contact had been made or physical aggression had been committed.) We had filled out the walk through paper work, made copies for the tenants and signed the original copy. The Tenants were given their copies and we offered to walk through the problem areas, which is when the situation escalated. The tenants are now claiming a walk through was never done.
Question #1: Is it required that the tenants be present for the walk through?
Question #2: Is it required that the tenants sign the final walk through?
Damage to the house:
There are multiple attempted repairs to the premise that were not approved or reported by the tenant. Putty patches in each room, the putty was not wiped off and is not flush with the wall and is very rough in texture. Each room has about 50 or more of these patches. In each room there are mis-matched painting patches (White gloss on Yellow flat walls) about 50 of these in each room, if the correct color had been used it may have blended and not been an issue. There is also heavy scuffing and marking on the walls from floor to ceiling and even on the ceiling. In one room the door knob had been punched through the wall despite the installed door stop to prevent such things, again there was an attempt to patch this but it was unprofessional and very poor workmanship. The Fire door to the garage had been severely scratched by their dog and the trim and weather stripping damaged. They sanded the molding down leaving a large (4") sanded hole in the trim, they also sanded and puttied the fire door and painted it with a thin coat of Flat yellow interior wall paint, they missed several spots on the door making it obvious that the attempted repair was done. There are also several stains that appeared in the carpet the day after the walk through which we did not have documented on the final walk through forum as they were not apparent at the time. The other interior doors have what look like colored pencil or scratch marks, but we feel this is normal wear and tear as the damage is not excessive to the interior doors.
Question #3: Can the tenant be held responsible for repairs and re-texturing of their attempted repairs to the walls?
Question #4: Can the tenant be held responsible for the cost of repainting the walls they have patched and used white gloss paint on yellow walls to try and touch up scuff marks?
Question #5: Is the tenant responsible for the cost to repair and repaint the Fire door after their failed attempt at repairing/hiding the damage?
Question #6: Is the tenant responsible for the replacement cost of the molding and weather stripping?
Question #7: Can the tenant be held responsible for any additional carpet cleaning for the spots that appeared but were not documented on the final walk through? This would only be if there was any additional carpet cleaning above and beyond the cost of standard professional cleaning.
Question #8: Are we correct in feeling that the scratching and marks on the interior doors is normal wear and tear?
Cleaning:
Other than attempted spot cleaning and vacuuming of the carpet no cleaning was done. The baseboards all have a caking of dust, dead bugs and grease. Windows were not cleaned and were covered in a layer of black dust, perhaps caused by a kitchen fire. The bathrooms have urine around the floor on the toilet and under the seat. The shower stalls still have the outline of there the shampoo and bar of soap sat, caked in soap scum and discolored. There is also a bar of soap stuck and molded into the wall in the upper corner of the shower. Blood was also found on one door, on the carpet and on a different door handle in the house. The freezer was left dirt and one shelf looks like a tub of ice cream melted and oozed out and left to sit for a year. The deposit what was paid was only to cover light/normal cleaning.
Question #9: Does the cleaning that needs to be done (blood, urine etc) fall under Light/Normal cleaning or is this heavy cleaning?
Question #10: If the cleaning is above and beyond light/normal cleaning can the tenant be held responsible for additional costs to clean the house?
Appliance Repair:
When we ran the appliances we found that the dish washer was over flowing and flooding the floor. There was no evidence of previous damage to the flooring which was a relief. But this problem was never reported by the tenants and they did not deny that it had happened before and when told about it they just said "Okay". After looking at the dish washer we found the trap to be full of debris and whole pieces of food. The outer edges of the dish washer were filthy and layered in mold, grim and soap scum. The door seal was torn and CAKED in mold and food gunk, which had deteriorated the rubber seal and no longer effectively stopping water from leaking out the door. We were able to order a replacement seal from the manufacturer and this will hopefully resolve the issue.
Question #11: Is the Tenant or Landlord responsible for the replacement part cost? I believe it is the landlord, but I might be wrong.
Replacement Lighting:
We also found that 4 lights were out and this was documented on the final walk through. I know this is minor issue but I thought the tenant was supposed to replace the lights and batteries of fire alarms before leaving the house.
Question #12: Is the tenant or landlord responsible for replacing the light bulbs at the final walk through?
We had a very eventful walk through over the weekend at our Single Family Home. The tenants attempted to aggressively snatch the walk through paper work from our hands and made physical contact in the process. They demanded to have their check on the spot and that "Nothing was wrong with the house." We had to leave the premises and get away from their verbal assaults and attempts at blocking our route to the car. The male Tenant then chased after us and found us parked on a side street not on the route to leave the Premises. He then turned toward us and went the wrong way down a one way street with his window down and driving aggressively fast to come up alongside where we had parked. We took off in our car for fear he had a gun and he proceeded to whip around chase us for about a mile and right off our bumper before realizing we were on the phone with the Police and requesting help. Note we have the entire altercation on video and tape recorder.
We had done the walk through earlier in the morning as we knew one could not be conducted with such volatile tenants. (This was not the first time they had escalated in verbal assaults and threats but this was the first time that physical contact had been made or physical aggression had been committed.) We had filled out the walk through paper work, made copies for the tenants and signed the original copy. The Tenants were given their copies and we offered to walk through the problem areas, which is when the situation escalated. The tenants are now claiming a walk through was never done.
Question #1: Is it required that the tenants be present for the walk through?
Question #2: Is it required that the tenants sign the final walk through?
Damage to the house:
There are multiple attempted repairs to the premise that were not approved or reported by the tenant. Putty patches in each room, the putty was not wiped off and is not flush with the wall and is very rough in texture. Each room has about 50 or more of these patches. In each room there are mis-matched painting patches (White gloss on Yellow flat walls) about 50 of these in each room, if the correct color had been used it may have blended and not been an issue. There is also heavy scuffing and marking on the walls from floor to ceiling and even on the ceiling. In one room the door knob had been punched through the wall despite the installed door stop to prevent such things, again there was an attempt to patch this but it was unprofessional and very poor workmanship. The Fire door to the garage had been severely scratched by their dog and the trim and weather stripping damaged. They sanded the molding down leaving a large (4") sanded hole in the trim, they also sanded and puttied the fire door and painted it with a thin coat of Flat yellow interior wall paint, they missed several spots on the door making it obvious that the attempted repair was done. There are also several stains that appeared in the carpet the day after the walk through which we did not have documented on the final walk through forum as they were not apparent at the time. The other interior doors have what look like colored pencil or scratch marks, but we feel this is normal wear and tear as the damage is not excessive to the interior doors.
Question #3: Can the tenant be held responsible for repairs and re-texturing of their attempted repairs to the walls?
Question #4: Can the tenant be held responsible for the cost of repainting the walls they have patched and used white gloss paint on yellow walls to try and touch up scuff marks?
Question #5: Is the tenant responsible for the cost to repair and repaint the Fire door after their failed attempt at repairing/hiding the damage?
Question #6: Is the tenant responsible for the replacement cost of the molding and weather stripping?
Question #7: Can the tenant be held responsible for any additional carpet cleaning for the spots that appeared but were not documented on the final walk through? This would only be if there was any additional carpet cleaning above and beyond the cost of standard professional cleaning.
Question #8: Are we correct in feeling that the scratching and marks on the interior doors is normal wear and tear?
Cleaning:
Other than attempted spot cleaning and vacuuming of the carpet no cleaning was done. The baseboards all have a caking of dust, dead bugs and grease. Windows were not cleaned and were covered in a layer of black dust, perhaps caused by a kitchen fire. The bathrooms have urine around the floor on the toilet and under the seat. The shower stalls still have the outline of there the shampoo and bar of soap sat, caked in soap scum and discolored. There is also a bar of soap stuck and molded into the wall in the upper corner of the shower. Blood was also found on one door, on the carpet and on a different door handle in the house. The freezer was left dirt and one shelf looks like a tub of ice cream melted and oozed out and left to sit for a year. The deposit what was paid was only to cover light/normal cleaning.
Question #9: Does the cleaning that needs to be done (blood, urine etc) fall under Light/Normal cleaning or is this heavy cleaning?
Question #10: If the cleaning is above and beyond light/normal cleaning can the tenant be held responsible for additional costs to clean the house?
Appliance Repair:
When we ran the appliances we found that the dish washer was over flowing and flooding the floor. There was no evidence of previous damage to the flooring which was a relief. But this problem was never reported by the tenants and they did not deny that it had happened before and when told about it they just said "Okay". After looking at the dish washer we found the trap to be full of debris and whole pieces of food. The outer edges of the dish washer were filthy and layered in mold, grim and soap scum. The door seal was torn and CAKED in mold and food gunk, which had deteriorated the rubber seal and no longer effectively stopping water from leaking out the door. We were able to order a replacement seal from the manufacturer and this will hopefully resolve the issue.
Question #11: Is the Tenant or Landlord responsible for the replacement part cost? I believe it is the landlord, but I might be wrong.
Replacement Lighting:
We also found that 4 lights were out and this was documented on the final walk through. I know this is minor issue but I thought the tenant was supposed to replace the lights and batteries of fire alarms before leaving the house.
Question #12: Is the tenant or landlord responsible for replacing the light bulbs at the final walk through?