Listen, we all know the Australian rental market is completely fucked right now. It’s no secret.
From absurdly high rental prices to mouldy and damaged properties to a sharp rise in homelessness since the pandemic, Aussie renters have had a pretty shit go of it recently.
And now it looks like current renters even have to worry about their routine rental inspections too. Sigh.
Yesterday Reddit user relled88 shared an excessive cleaning checklist ostensibly passed on to the renter so they could prepare for a routine property inspection. The list was sent from an unnamed Sydney real estate agent.
In the post to the Sydney subreddit, the user wrote “Is it just me, or is this checklist for a routine inspection from a REA in Sydney completely excessive and unreasonable?”
The checklist was, indeed, a long one. It included a whopping 32 items, including chores like “tops of cupboards to be cleaned,” “all light fittings to be cleaned and free from insects,” and “all [outside] garbage bins to be emptied and washed clean.” Sheesh!
As a renter myself, I’ve always treated inspections as an opportunity to give the house a good clean. It’s nice to be house proud and keep your place tidy. But it really seems very OTT for a real estate agent to demand that you wash the outside rubbish bins… right?
Unless they’re like, illegally stinky, I’m going to leave the rubbish bins alone thank you very much.
Comments on the post were incredulous.
“For an end of lease checklist that is fairly reasonable IMO. For a routine monthly or quarterly inspection, they can get fucked,” one user said.
“I vacuum and make sure the dishes and washing is put away. Beyond that they can get fucked because I am working 6 days a week 12 hours a day to afford their exorbitant rent hikes,” said another. Amen to that.
Just a note to all the real estate agents out there — maybe cool it on the inspection cleaning checklists, OK? Aussie renters are feeling a bit flat ATM. No one wants to clean the dead bugs out of their light fittings while they’re already under the pump.
