Clean windows are an indispensable part of a rental home’s curb appeal. Whether you are seeking a new tenant or already have a long-term lease secured, it is important to have your windows cleaned at least once a year. This is to keep your rental home’s value high and ensure that your renters remain happy. Considering the terms of your lease and the type of windows you have, you may ask yourself, “Whose job is this exactly?”
An expectation that Grand Rapids property owners may have that is both fair and reasonable is for tenants to perform basic window cleaning, especially if they live in single story homes. This chore includes the cleaning of interior windows and, perhaps, ground-level exterior windows too. A problem arises when your tenants don’t fully grasp the meaning of “completely clean” and they cut corners instead. This would leave you more work in the long run.
Keep this caution in mind: you should never ask your renters to clean windows if they need a stool or ladder to get to them. According to the World Health Organization, more than 164,000 people go to the emergency room due to injuries involving ladder use at home each year, while falls from ladders cause an average of 300 deaths per year. Safety takes priority, which means it is a bad idea for tenants to perform maintenance tasks where they have to get up on ladders. You should not request this nor allow it, even if they ask for permission.
For the majority of exterior windows and all the windows that are difficult to reach– unless you use ladders or other equipment– it would be best to leave them to professional window cleaners. This is extra important for specialty windows. So, if your rental homes have tinted windows, stained glass, or leaded windows, they should be handled differently. If the wrong cleaning solution gets used on these windows, there may be permanent damage. This would produce expensive repair costs that would affect you down the road.
In a similar train of thought, the use of wrong tools to clean windows can leave them streaked, spotted, or worse. It’s extremely unlikely that your tenant owns a high-grade squeegee, let alone know how to use it properly and have had a lot of experience with it. So if you have them do this task, pretty much every other possible scenario would end up with you regretting that decision. Being able to properly clean window tracks and weep holes is also something that needs to be considered. If these portions aren’t cared for properly, it could cause harm to the window and the home.
When you want to have your windows cleaned, it’s important to hire a quality service provider. If it’s a reasonably priced professional window cleaning in Grand Rapids that you’re looking for, where do you go? There are some enterprising individuals out there that advertise their window cleaning services without actually having the knowledge and experience needed to do the job properly.
There is no need to worry. At Real Property Management Investment Solutions, we are well connected in the industry and we can assure you that the windows on your rental homes will be handled well by skilled professionals. With a trusted list of vendors, you can relax and leave the window cleaning and other property maintenance matters to us. Contact us online or ring us up at 616-419-8880 today.
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