3rd August 2007

Choosing Colors For Rental Properties

posted in Care and Feeding of Tenants |

Cliff over at ChangingMyDirection.com recently made a post about choosing interior colors for one of his rental properties and it reminded me about a couple of conversations I’ve had with tenants about painting and colors.Tenants and painting

The first story is about one of the better tenants I had who moved because his new “piece of work” girlfriend said that the place was “too small.” She pestered me for about 2 weeks with phone calls about painting the exterior of the house a different color saying how she couldn’t stand it, etc. Now, the exterior color is yellow with a dark green roof. It’s not a dull yellow where you’re not sure if something spilled on the house or what, but it’s not neon yellow like Madonna’s leg-warmers in the 80′s either.

I let her know that the house was just painted 2 years prior and that I would change the color but my painter had to do the work and she would have to pay for it. Needless to say that the house is still yellow and she doesn’t live there anymore.

The next story is about another tenant who got a little bent over the fact the I changed the roof color from dark brown to green due to a shortage of brown shingles when replacing the roof (or maybe I just like the color green.) The exterior color of the house is a really light brown, almost cream.

After the roof was replaced he just couldn’t get over the green color for about 2 weeks. I spoke with him a few times within those weeks and he mentioned it every time. I felt like saying, “Dude! I’m not going to rip the new shingles off or repaint the house because you can’t wrap your head around forest green!”

The house is still cream and the roof is still green but he doesn’t live there anymore but not because of the color issue.

As far as the interiors, always ultra-white, satin finish.

There are currently 3 responses to “Choosing Colors For Rental Properties”

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  1. 1 On August 3rd, 2007, Trisha said:

    Tell me about it! I don’t allow any tenant to paint the interior, either. I’ve never had one complaint about an exterior color. But, I just have images of paint splatters all over the carpet and paint roller marks all over the ceilings. No way! In my mind, choosing paint colors goes only with o-w-n-e-r-s-h-i-p.

  2. 2 On August 3rd, 2007, Bruce said:

    Hi Trisha,

    I know, right? Fortunately all of our rentals are tiled inside, so no carpet to ruin but you just know they’ll paint over the ivory switch & outlet plates with white paint.

    Ya, no painting for tenants.

  3. 3 On August 3rd, 2007, Paul Dizmang said:

    We have all done it. My tenant only wanted to paint one room; I agreed. He did, all of it; the walls, ceilings, trim, even the light fixture the same puke green. Never do that again.

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