Let the Games Begin!

I officially started work on the rental house today. It is going to be alot of work, but I love doing this kind of stuff. I moved all of my construction tools over there yesterday and organized them today. I then spent some time taking photographs of any damage or dirty areas, to include in my security deposit report to the vacating tenants. The big issues are:
-Brand new carpet completely trashed and needs replaced in one bedroom
-Brand new carpet not cleaned or vacuumed in master bedroom. Will try to steam clean.
-Oven/stove filthy
-They tried to apply a polyurethane finish to the hardwood floors to cover some scratches they made. They did a horrible job, and missed spots. They also applied the poly over some drink spills, and sloshed it all over the new white base moldings, and on the bottom of the doors. This is going to take some time to fix. I will have to sand down the entire wood floor (800 sq ft) and refinish them, as well as repaint the doors and the base trim.
-Sod replacement in the back yard (approx 1000 sq ft). They had a requirement in the lease to keep their dog in an enclosed area of mulch in the backyard. They did not do that and the dog urine killed large areas of the new sod that was thick and plush and green.
-Tenants let weeds overtake the mulch area. It looks like a jungle and will take a great deal of effort to fix (approx 800 sq ft)
-Tenants did not water the lawn yet this year, resulting in dry, brown sod. I should be able to save it with frequent watering now.

I have a clause in my lease that requires the tenants to care for the lawn and that dead lawn/weeds will be charged for repairing.

Lots of other dirty areas, but not worth going into...

I also wire brushed the garage door to remove loose paint, masked the windows, and got about 2/3 of it painted. I also went to Home Depot and bought 5 gal of exterior paint, 5 gal of interior paint, a framing nailer, and some Round Up weed stuff. I also turned on the sprinkler system today, and noted that the copper line outside the house had ruptured because the tenants did not drain it last winter (I checked on it in mid-October and took care of it, but it had already frozen once or twice during some early cold nights). I'll be cutting that out and silver soldering in a new line tomorrow...

You may wonder why I am mentioning the rental house it this blog... Because the rental house represents Nemo's Coffee operating capital! I am going to do the clean up and repairs to the house, then sell it. Since we lived in the house for 2 of the last 5 years, there will be no capital gains taxes due. We should be able to fix it, sell it 10% below market value (for a quick sale), and come out with approx $25k to put into Nemo's account. This is important since we were $30,000 over budget on construction!

Gotta run.
JD