I have a new tenant that has been here 8 days. In VA and it’s been cold!! He tells me yesterday morning that the only heater working is the one in his bedroom and the small space heater I have left up there.
So the living room/kitchen combo, the bathroom and the common area hallway do not work. Mind you, it has been below freezing here at least 4 nights in the past week.
I tell him I will send my husband up there in less than 2 hours to check everything out. He says ok.
So now I see, after renting this apt for over 25+ years and about 2-3 years Airbnb, I need to test all heaters before my first winter tenant.
Now my problem. Tenant comes back about 20 min. later and says he’s not comfortable letting anyone inside the apt. because of Covid. So now what do I do????? He wants to reset the breakers instead of my husband. So I tell him how. Long story short, after an hour, he still wants no one inside and wants more space heaters. Well my building is 100+ years old, space heaters are not to be used as NORMAL heat, and he can’t test the breakers, the thermostats or the hydronic baseboard heaters. Not to mention, I’m not paying a ridiculously high electric bill on space heaters!! SOOOOOOOOOO?????
So I talk to my electrician, nice country gentleman that I have used for over 30 years. He has no problem masking and gloving up, since he does so already. So we plan on him going up into the common area hallway to test the breakers and that 1 heater he can get to. (This morning) The tenant agrees to that.
Electrician calls me this morning and says all the breakers are fine. The hallway heater actually works, the thermostat just wasn’t turned up enough to come on. And after talking with the tenant through the door, he still refused to let the electrician in to check the other heaters. So the electrician tells him to turn them all up to high. Tenant says he has done so several times.
SO not only am I concerned for my tenant being warm and comfortable, worried about my water pipes freezing and the sanity of my tenant...I now have ONE bill so far, to pay my electrician for going upstairs and turning the knob on a heater up. Because the tenant didn’t want my husband coming up there.
So someone please tell me what I’m supposed to do???????
I need SOMEONE to go inside the apt. and actually check that the thermostats have been turned up high enough, then test the thermostats in 2 rooms. Easy fix, if the thermostats are bad, easy to replace them.
If I have to replace 3 hydronic baseboard heaters (which sounds fishy) it will cost me an easy $600-800 in heaters and labor.
How do I deal with this guy???? He seems irrational to me. We do not have a large no. of Covid cases here, we only have about 14,000 people here, we are way out in the country and I think have 2-3 deaths. I’ve lived here all my life and know 4 people that have been quarantined and none that got sick. I’m at a loss as to how to deal with this.
I personally have continued to live my life, I mask up when I have to, I work from home so I seldom leave. I just spent 2 wonderful weeks in key west and south Florida in early November and had no fear of flying or getting Covid. Masked up everyplace I was supposed to, etc.
So please tell me how to handle this.