Rental properties and pets

[sconeonamission]

We arecurrently looking for a new place to rent as the owners are selling. Pita too, our contract is up with them in 4 wks ( was 5 when they notified us). We found a place we really like, but no pets. That was the only reason our application was not successful. All the places that have pets allowed, or at owners discretion, are dodgy scruffy places, and some cases over priced. We eventually want to buy, hopefully find something while we are renting the new place. We asked mumto look after our two cats (they're 3yrs old), just while we rent for 12 months. Even offered to pay "maintenance" as it were. We called the place we were knocked back from, to say mum wouldhave them, can we have the place now? They've yet to call me back but mum has said no now, she can't have them. A little ****ed off, but now don't know what to do! Ideally I'd like someone to look after them, but dh does think its likely anyone will want to look after them, and we should give them away. Whos going to want two 3yo cats?

[Lulu]

Kill me if you will, but I've always hidden my puddy tat....

[Arimeh]

Ahhh I understand your frustration - it was exactly the same when we were trying to find a rental down here in tas. We had to go with the first one we were accepted into - and its a bit higher rent than we were wanting to pay, but we had no choice!

I always think its funny that landlords are so funny about animals, when kids can do a lot more damage to the place!!! My cats are pretty good (and do not chew the architraves as I was asked when applying fora property!) but DS got crayon on the cupboard door the other day and it took me about 15 minutes of pure elbow grease to get it off. My cats don't cause that kind of damage!!!

I hope you get someone to look after your cats. If I was up there and living in our own home I would do it

(Actually if your mum can take them for a few months, you can always send them to tassie at the end of the year cos we're hoping to be in our own place by then? I don't mind looking after them for you... xxxx)

[Shades]

I'm with Lulu... we've always just taken the kitties for a drive in the car when there was a house inspection or landlord visiting or whatever. Especially if there're floorboards/tiles instead of carpet - cats really don't do much damage!

[FabFiona]

I've always found that despite what the paperwork says, landlords were pretty relaxed about cats. It's just dogs that they tend to be worried about as for some reason, they associate dogs with property damage.

Are you willing to risk hiding the cats? Depending on how many inspections your landlord is planning, cats are pretty easy to hide.

[Phteven]

I never bother telling them - if there's an inspection I hide the evidence.

[Visitor7]

I agree with everyone else, hide them. They're cats, they don't take up much room and don't leave mess around (unlike dogs) so they're easy to hide.

[Jennifer13]

I think this is the first place I ever lived in where the landlord knows that we have two dogs (and now two hens). We've had them in two places previously, and they just went for a long walk when we had an inspection. We usually left the place in better condition that it was in previously, so it was never questioned.

Cats are even easier - having had two in the past that were never 'on the books'!

I agree that the children are more of an issue. That and stupid friends who drink too much (or an angry partner who throws things at the walls - not my DP this time!).

[YoYo]

Being a 'landlordette' I wouldn't give a carp about cats in my house. They aren't like dogs, and our tenants have one of them. Hide them I say

[christy]

LOL! We used to have people drop off their cats for a day on inspection days

[Megan]

We were having trouble finding a place for our two dogs so offered a "dog bond" which was $500 on top of our normal bond in case the dogs did any damage to the property. Once we did that, we were approved straight away at a house that originally stated no pets. Obviously we still looked after the place and when we left there were no problems and we got the whole bond back.

[Lulu]

We were having trouble finding a place for our two dogs so offered a "dog bond" which was $500 on top of our normal bond in case the dogs did any damage to the property. Once we did that, we were approved straight away at a house that originally stated no pets. Obviously we still looked after the place and when we left there were no problems and we got the whole bond back.

I think this concept is relatively new to Victoria (I may be wrong) - lots of my interstate friends told me about the 'dog bond' and no RE or landlord I've ever come across seem to know wtf I was talking about!

[ss_storm]

Would it help if you got 'references' for the cats? If you have a couple of people, say your vet and someone else, who can vouch for the cats and write a short letter saying they are well looked after, house trained etc. I think it's surprising how many rentals are "no pets allowed" considering how many families in Australia have pets!

we have a dog and struggled to get our landlord to allow us to get him. our 'pet clause' in our lease says he is not allowed inside, but before DD came along he was inside regularly, just didn't live inside, and the real estate don't know any different.
DF really wants to get a cat but I don't think we can convince the landlord/real estate to allow us to have one. I think it's dumb...if you're going to look after their property you will do it regardless of if you have a pet or not, people who are going to trash a place will do it whether or not they have a pet...it's not the pet it's their owner!

good luck, I hope you find somewhere you will be allowed to have the cats! Or sneak them in! You can always drop them off at a boarding kennel or a friend's place for the day when you have an inspection.

[helle]

Kill me if you will, but I've always hidden my puddy tat....

Yeah I'd be inclined to "leave them out" of the applications too, so to speak. Cats are pretty low key and don't destroy anything in a house, ever. Well Mum's doesn't, the only reason you even know he's there is when he comes out in winter for some body heat. The only worry would be surprise visits and to make sure they're well hidden at rent inspections ...

[Glamourcide]

Wow, I'm so glad I'm with nearly everyone else on the hiding thing!! DH and I bought a kitten like five minutes after we moved in together, as we're both cat lovers. We didn't give a stuff that the real estate demanded no pets be kept on the property - every place we rented (and we ended up with two cats) had that stipulation but we always kept our cats clean and the place tidy, and our parents would take turns minding the cats overnight before an inspection (which was about every 6 months and/or upon vacating the premises at the end of the lease). We just never mentioned we had animals, then when we recieved notice of an upcoming inspection, we'd drop them (and food bowls/litter tray etc) off at my parents' or the in-laws' the night before, go home and give the place a good vaccuum to get rid of any extra cat hair, then as soon as the property manager left the next day we'd go around and pick them up!
As a PP said, kids do FAR more damage than cats, and dogs are the same (unless they chew things/dig holes, but those problems can be fixed/covered up, too), and DH and I happily paid exterminators out of our own pocket to fumigate for fleas upon the expiration of our lease (except for the second place we lived in, because when we moved in we discovered a serious roach infestation which the real estate agent NEVER got around to sorting out despite several notices from us requesting it be dealt with, so ner ner, have some fleas, buttheads!) so that the next tenants got no nasty surprises.

Seriously, I'd crawl through broken glass to keep my furbabies, no real estate agent on the face of the planet is going to stop me keeping my pets, I don't care what the lease contract says about 'no pets'. What they don't know won't keep them up at night Good luck!

[Megan]

I think this concept is relatively new to Victoria (I may be wrong) - lots of my interstate friends told me about the 'dog bond' and no RE or landlord I've ever come across seem to know wtf I was talking about!

I'm in Vic and the RE we dealt with had never heard of it either, but put it to the owners and they were ok with it. I saw it on one of those property shows 5+ years ago.
Once the owners agreed, they just tacked it on to the end of the lease and added the amount to our normal bond.

[Indadhanu]

Yep, one place we rented we hid our kitty. She's an outside cat anyway, we don't let her come inside, so at inspections we just hide the evidence, and if she was in sight during the inspection (which only happened once LOL!) I just said oh, thats a neighbours cat, silly thing keeps coming into our yard. Isn't she so friendly, you can pat her and everything ... ... ...

Ooops.

[Jennifer13]

Yes, I had a RE agent drop around once and quickly chucked dogs and stuff into our back bedroom. (He shouldn't have been there without making an appointment but he was w-e-i-r-d in a 'way too interested in what my tenant is up to' kinda way.) I just looked embarrassed and said there was no way I could let him into the bedroom, I hadn't tidied up. I have no idea whether that's what sparked his ongoing obsession with coming around to see me (what on earth did he think was in the bedroom??), until I palmed him off onto DP to deal with!