I have read the past posts on this topic and wanted to revisit it. I currently pay managers or contractors to mow depending on the park, but tenants mow their own lot. They often do not, and it is troublesome to post a violation, wait, then mow, then invoice. I changed policy to mow without notice after lawn exceeds 6". Still there is admin burden to that, so I am thinking of having the mower do all common areas and all lots. The extra cost would be paid by increasing rents. Advantage is a more uniform park and better overall appearance. Does anybody have any opinion on this?
I do not take on the responsibility of maintaining tenants lots. Our rules state that the tenants must maintain their lots to our community standards. When a tenant does not do so they receive a warning notice. If my contractor then must cut the grass the fee is $100. This usually corrects the problem. If the problem persists they will receive a eviction notice. There is no point in having rules and standards if you are going to allow your residents to ignore them.
Pride of ownership is a key component of maintaining the standards of any community. You screen applicants to insure they are a good fit and get rid of those that are not. If it is too much for a tenant to cut their grass the likely hood is you have a tenant that is overall a detriment to the community in many other ways.
I would also be reluctant to mow everyone’s lot - you’re sending conflicting signals about pride of ownership and tenant responsibility. I would increase the penalty for not mowing to help cover the extra administrative costs.
I also give a lot of autonomy to my managers on these subjects to limit my time involvement. My on site manager has access to violation forms, and the ability in our property management software to add penalties to any lot. They’re trained if this happens to take photos documenting the item, issue a violation notice, and then add a fee onto the resident’s account. There’s minimal headache on my end.
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