Yes, thanks for the clarification. Is this something you spell out in your lease, or is it something you discuss with tenants at move in, or is it something you deal with if/when they give you calls over issues that they ought to take care of themselves?
It's a clause in the lease, and when we go through the lease when they move in, it's one of the few points I stress and we discuss to make sure they understand and are clear on it (the other being the date the rent is late, and when they will start accruing late fees).
We have a clause that makes it clear that tenants are responsible if they break things or let things get broken due to neglect. Another clause says that they must notify us promptly if things need maintenance or repair. I guess that pretty much covers us legally, but I will be sure to be crystal clear with policy on move ins.
I'd rather try and find a good management company than try and convert a friend or relative into one. Obviously if you have someone who has already been managing their own properties or whatever for a long time that may not apply.
We got lucky here, some of our good friends are landlords and agreed to take calls for the few days here and there when none of us are available in the area. In the future, I don't think we'll need to rely on them at all, because with Google Voice and the ability to contact anyone in the world from anywhere else in the world, it should be easy to deal with almost all issues, including maintenance and repairs, without being physically close to the property.
Honestly, whenever I hear talk about property managers, the consensus seems to be, "Well, if you can find the right one, and you know how to check up on them, they can be great, but if you let them, they'll be happy to take their monthly paycheck and let you get ripped off by contractors and tenants".
With the exception of very large complexes, like 50+ unit properties, I don't know that property management is worth it.
As far as the changing light bulbs goes, this just happened to us. We have wonderful tenants from Beijing who have been with us a year. They are quite wealthy, but just establishing themselves in Canada and taking it slow. They are so pleasant to deal with. We were served tea and home-made cakes in their impeccably clean unit for their lease renewal and the only issue they brought up was burned-out light-bulbs which I expect would have been culturally driven. We happily changed them for them without saying a word about it being their responsibility, and said call us if you need anything else. Mind you, they live in the duplex at the front of our property so another burned-out light bulb would mean a walk down the drive.
We had one guy get locked out of his unit, and although our lease says there's a $50 lockout fee, this guy had never called us for anything before, was prompt with his payment, and has always been friendly when we have met him. So he didn't pay a dime.
I don't know if I agree with being overly friendly with tenants, especially before you've struck up a friendship with them, but if a friendship is indeed struck up, then I agree with being kind to one's friends.
Also--and I apologize for derailment--but what do you all recommend doing for payment of rent? At the moment, our tenants give us cash in person, or else mail checks, but naturally this has a slight time lag and tenants can claim that checks were lost in the mail and stuff. We also want to avoid going over there even once a month, if possible.
Can we give them deposit slips that they use to deposit cash/checks into our bank account? The problem with this is that we have no way of really telling who paid rent and who didn't, and they don't get a receipt or anything for their own records, do they?