[webignition]

I recently dealt with restoring a rented two-storey house owned by my girlfriend which was rented out to a couple owning five cats.

One of the cats was old and infirm and peed repeatedly indoors on carpeted floor. The smell was horrendous. I can't see how the tenant lived with it.

We replaced a large proportion of the carpet throughout the house.

The deposit covered the costs only because we carried out the work ourselves as part of a larger renovation project in advance of selling.

If we had gone down a more hands-off approach followed by investment-focused landlords, the costs would easily have exceeded the rental deposit which would have resulted in the need to sue the previous tenant.

That's a whole lot of effort to go to for a landlord and I can see how a landlord would choose to avoid pet owners given the option.

[sokoloff]

My parents had a rental for 17 years and as they were preparing to retire to another state let the tenant know they'd be selling the place in the next year or so. We paid to one-time pickup the dog poop, and let them know they'd need to keep up the backyard after that (per the lease, but we'd let it slide for years as it was a single-family).

A bit over a year later, tenant moves out and we discover that the backyard is clean because they simply stopped letting the (large breed dog) out. Every bit of carpet and subfloor needed replacing (literally cut out as close as we could with circular saws, seal the 1.5" we couldn't reach, and air the place out; the neighbors complained about the smell and asked if we could keep the windows closed). The wood was soaked/swelled in many places with urine. Every air vent and return was rusted from urine. More than one contractor "no bid" the work; one complained that he was going to have to throw his work boots away after the walk-through.

The tenant had about 2 nickels to rub together, so parents lost a lot of expected gains on that deal.

[erroneousfunk]

My husband and I replaced a carpet in our last apartment ourselves before move out (hired a professional, got it matched exactly with the rest of the carpets, replaced carpet pad as well, cleaned concrete subfloor) because our cat decided that one corner of the living room was an appropriate place to urinate.

She's usually a well-behaved cat, never did anything like this before, and we tried everything we could think of to get her to stop. We spent over a year and hundreds of dollars trying to repeatedly clean the spot, shampooing, steaming, enzymes, but nothing worked.

Our deposit was only $500, but we spent about $1600 replacing the carpet (it was the right thing to do and, like you said, they can sue us). There was NOTHING you could do to get that out besides just replacing it. And that was just one room. Multiply by 5 or 6 for replacing carpets all over the house, and that's more than a landlord can even reasonably hold as a security deposit. And what if we had had a wood subfloor instead of concrete? That would quickly get into the 5 figures.

It seemed like an ideal pet situation -- good cat, no history of urinating outside the litter box, responsible pet owners, regular vet checkups, doing everything we could to try and clean and get her to stop, cared very much about the cleanliness of our living space, but we STILL had to replace the carpet.

Honestly, especially after that experience, I don't blame landlords at all. I own a house now and don't think I'd ever want to, say, rent a room to a stranger with a cat. And I have a cat!

[exDM69]

But that's just gross neglect. As a cat owner, I have to deal with the occasional pee on the floor and there are specialized detergents that are very effective in getting rid of the smell.

You do get desensitized to the smell, though. The first time cleaning the litter box I almost vomited, these days it's a mild inconvenience at most. When I get guests, I'll clean the litter box as a precaution, someone else's nose might think the smell is horrible but I'd barely notice it (I don't ever let it get that bad).

I do get the point from a landlord's point of view, though. Why take the risk if there are other tenants who don't carry that.

Although I think it should be negotiable with a larger deposit rather than flat out refusal. Pets increase the quality of life.

[webignition]

Yes, I absolutely agree.

My comments from the perspective of a landlord weren't intended to generalise pet owners.

I own two cats (although I suspect they actually own me) and have previously rented houses and have offered a per-cat additional deposit in cases where landlords were adamant.

One of my cats is easily stressed out which can lead to uninary tract infections and which may have contributed to her chronic irritable bowel syndrome.

Both conditions (the former intermittent, the latter constant) can result in unexpected indoor urination and surprise vomiting.

Cleaning up either is perfectly achievable given the correct care and attention.

Despite being exposed over many years to a variety of cat by-products, I still haven't grown accustomed to the smell of cat urine such that I could ignore it. Sometimes I wish I could!

[erroneousfunk]

I made a post about this, above, but I would argue that urine isn't always possible to completely clean in some situations. We lived in a place with a carpet and a thick pad under the carpet. Combined with a cat that spontaneously decided to habitually urinate in that one spot (no history of it). We tried EVERYTHING -- it was a massive project for over a year to get her to stop and spent hundreds of dollars on cleaning. Every enzyme product and shampoo, hours of elbow grease, soaking, drying, re-soaking, re-drying. We caught it as soon as it happened, gave LOTS of care and attention, but no dice.

Even the most responsible owners with the best pets can have problems that can't be fixed without just replacing the entire carpet. It happens.

[dTal]

Sometimes with latrine animals like cats and rabbits it's better to just give in and put the damn litterbox in the spot they've picked.