If you have followed our advice so far, you already will have alerted your preferred vendors of the time frame during which you will need their services. Now call them and put them to work on the property. Ask the workmen to keep their eyes open for anything they believe looks like sabotage. Instruct them to provide detailed invoices for all their work and make sure they will cooperate if it is necessary for them to appear before a judge to justify their work and charges for it. You should keep careful track of all of your expenses, retaining invoices, and keeping logs of your own work.
Many landlords do some or all of the work of getting a unit ready to re-rent.
If you do this, keep track of your time. Some judges are skeptical about awarding compensation for a landlord s own time, but there is no reason not to claim it. It should be kept reasonable, however. Remember, if you are a Senior Programmer, the reasonable hourly rate for cleaning an apartment is not the hourly rate of a Senior Programmer cleaning the apartment. You may claim only the reasonable value of the work.