"However, third parties definitely have their own opinion."
and
"What do you think I would pay for labor to install 2,000 sq. ft. of flooring?"
lmao I love it! I'm right there with you. 2000+ sq ft?? That's a shit load of flooring. I'm sure it weighed a ton. Big props for taking that on! I don't know how to use emojis on here, but "muscle flex" emoji for your my man! Let's be honest here though, it's college kids. You could have done the repairs any time and they most likely wouldn't give a shit (and sounds like you did it during different months).
I am curious though. How do you personally assess dogs? It's very common in my area for high end tenants to have them and I have always turned them down. I'm considering opening up that option, but can't get over how destructive they "could" be.
When deciding to accept dogs, I think the biggest concern would be flooring. Now that my carpeting is gone and I installed LVP, I welcome dogs. I am getting a bigger pool of tenants in which to choose and more rent.
No estimates on how much money I saved? For context, the house is in Fort Collins, CO. I think the house is worth around 410k. According to zillow, the median house price for single family homes in the zip code are 487K. I personally think that's a little high. I think the neighborhood is probably closer to 450K.
The rental house is 177 miles from my primary residence. However, my family and I stayed with my sister-in-law, who lives 42 miles south of the rental house (45 minutes). The repair was split into 3 phases over 3 different months. 5 days, 4 days and 4 days.
My best estimate for total miles driven was 2,035 and my car gets 34 mpg. If I average $2.00/gallon, I spend about $120 on gas. However, I get to deduct 57.5 cents/mile on my taxes, which is $1170. At 12% for federal tax and 4.5% for state tax, this is a tax savings of $193.
This did cost me about 104 hours of labor (13 days), another 36 hours of driving time, $50 in supplies and $50 in trips to the dump. However, all the work was completed when I was on summer break or winter break.
I spoke to a few friends and they agreed with $3.00 sq. ft. for install and 50 cents sq. ft. for removal. This puts me at $7,000. I would probably lose another $1000 due to 7-10 days of vacancy, so now I'm at $8,000. Feel free to disagree if you think these estimates are high. I asked the forum, but I didn't get any estimates from the MMM crowd.
For me personally, I could spend about 70 days on Kauai for $8,000. Would I trade 13 days of labor for 70 days on Kauai? For me personally, the answer is yes.