What to Expect When You Move into Your New Rental Home

Are you wondering what to expect when you move into your new rental home? If you answered “yes,” you are not alone. This is one of the biggest recurring questions property managers are asked. In fact, our North Carolina property management team often fields questions from tenants about what they should expect in regards to move-in property conditions and ongoing rental property maintenance. We’ll address these issues below.

Moving into Your New Rental Home

Congratulations on signing your new lease! You made a rental search plan, found a great property, made it through the tenant screening process, and now you have the keys to your new rental home. What should you expect when you move into your new home? What do property management companies mean by move-in property condition?

First, it is important to understand that property management policies and procedures differ from company to company. With that in mind, we will share what you can expect when you rent a home in Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill from Red Door Company. This move-in property condition information will provide you with a guide to help set realistic expectations.

Move-In Rental Property Condition

When you take possession of your rental property, your property manager should have taken the necessary steps to have your new home move-in ready. At Red Door Company, move-in property condition means your new home will be professionally cleaned – including carpet cleaning – and routine maintenance (replacing blown light bulbs, changing batteries in smoke alarms, installing a new HVAC filter, tightening cabinet drawer hinges, etc.) will be performed prior to you moving into your rental home.

There may be exceptions to this rule. For example, if you need to take possession of your rental property quickly after the previous tenants move out, there may not be enough time to accomplish the above move-in ready tasks. In a case like this, our North Carolina property management team would discuss this with the tenant before the move-in date and set expectations for when these tasks will be completed.

Property Maintenance Expectations

On the first day you take possession of your rental property, you will want to fill out a move-in condition report addressing any issues you find. Give that to your property manager to avoid any problems when you move out of the rental property at the end of your tenancy. What about repairs and maintenance during your tenancy? How will those be addressed?

As we mentioned previously, that is another recurring question we receive from new tenants in our North Carolina rental homes. Here is how we address ongoing property maintenance and repairs: first and foremost, tenant requested repairs, not property improvements, should be acknowledged and assigned to a vendor in a reasonable amount of time.

Our tenants use an online portal to submit maintenance requests. Those requests are delivered automatically to your property manager for immediate action. The next step is for your property manager to review your request to determine the fastest and most efficient resolution and to obtain approval from the landlord to make the necessary repairs. If your landlord rejects the repair request, this information will be communicated to you as quickly as possible.

Hopefully, the above information addressed your questions about what to expect when you move into your new rental home. If you have further questions about renting a home, make sure to review the rest of our Renter’s Guide articles. The team at Red Door Company will also be glad to address any of your questions about renting in North Carolina or any of your North Carolina rental properties. Please do not hesitate to contact us with those questions.