Ok here is the deal folks...I have been on both sides of this debate, as a tenant and as a landlord. I am a former General Contractor, so I have had experience with resident homeowners and renting Landlords. Unfortunately, we can not use a label to define a generalization for 'landlords' or 'tenants' based solely on those labels; just as we can not do that with a person's race. There are ethical landlords and tenants, and there are pieces of &%$@s from both. My current landlord is a scum bag. He thinks it is the responsibility of every tenant to maintain the "rentability" of his investment, charging former leasees an outlandish $25/hour to caulk nail holes, while paying the worker $9/hour cash. I know because I used to help him and am good friends with the manager. There is such a thing as "normal wear and tear". OK, here are the rules: A landlord may not charge a tenant for normal wear and tear. Small nail holes used to hang pictures? Normal. Ordinary paint discoloration? Normal. Minor scuffs on floors and carpets? Normal. However, that does not mean you can leave the apartment in complete disgust, when you move out. AND it doesn't mean you are obligated to have the apartment professionally cleaned, unless noted in the lease agreement. (If such a clause does exist, go online to see if it is even legal in your state to require that. If it is even legal, there are probably tenant provisions, with regard to obligations.) A "clean" house is subjective to the person looking at it. Some people are freaks about cleanliness. Others are fine if the main elements of the house are clean, leaving dust to settle as it may. And yet others think that if there is a path to walk from one room to the other, they are ready for company. So unless otherwise noted in a clause in the lease, bringing a rental property up to the same exact condition, as it was in when a tenant moved in is the responsibility of the LANDLORD, or investing owner, of the unit being used as a business, money making, profit earning property. Otherwise, each tenant that performs the necessary measures to bring a unit up to "move in" status, would then be entitled to a stake or share in any future profits gained by the maintenance of the property, beyond normal wear and tear. And remember that No Clause or section of a lease agreement or any other contract can be written in a way that is breaks any local, state, or federal laws. So if you think something doesn't smell right, spend an hour researching it on Google, taking the time to check the sources. Is it a forum like this that may have facts mentioned but is not a reliable source for legal facts? Or is it your state's .gov site that gives the actual statutes written into law...maybe even the local housing authority...or a lawyer that has offered free online material in eFormat to gain potential clients? There are certain risks involved in lending, renting, granting temporary usage or access to one's own possessions or properties. If what a landlord is charging for rent is not enough to maintain the unit, that does not entitle him/her to use any portion of the Security Deposit to maintain a 'perfect' status of rentability for future tenants. The landlord should rent the unit for more, to cover those costs of what every business has, as part of its functionality: OVERHEAD! We all know the difference between blatant damage, intentional or not, and normal living. And we all know that some tenants are just scum bags and should probably be confined to disposable housing of some sort, if such a thing existed. But no matter how many times a landlord has been burnt by one of those tenants, he/she still can't take it out on the next tenant by insisting on unreasonable maintenance on a property that they do NOT own. Side Note: As landlords, did you know that you are REQUIRED to add your state's interest percentage to the deposit total times the number of years/months the tenant has rented the unit(s)? In Minnesota it is now 1%. That may not sound like much, but if you add up all that for say 100 units, at an average security of $750 X .01 = $7.50/year times every unit. That may not seem like much, but it does add up over time, and that interest money does not belong to the landlord, it belongs to the tenants. Also, in that time, the landlord should have been earning around 5% on that same money, sitting in a bank account. ~~@ robine66~~ So to answer your question...is it unreasonable for your landlord to request the condition be as close to the condition as it was when you moved in? Not really. Are you legally obligated to leave the unit property in the exact same condition that you received it in? No...to the extent discussed above. Now comes the real question...SHOULD YOU leave it in the best condition possible for her? That is an ethical question that only you can answer. Was she a good landlady? Did she treat you with respect and take care of any issues diligently, upon your request? Does she have limited resources to do this herself? Most important of all...Are you going to be able to have a clean conscience, knowing you did what was right? Remember...Doing what you are legally obligated to do is not always doing what is RIGHT. Doing what is RIGHT always trumps doing what you have the right to do.

Hello Beverly Hills Isn't That the way it is? In any relationship or discussion a good, healthy dose of common sense can make things work. Common sense allows for discussion of a matter with both, or all three sides contributing beneficial input. Taking things to an extreme can mess up any relationship or discussion. In any relationship there is a healthy give and take. No husband or wife is always right or sees everything that can be done to make a marriage work. Two personalities brought together requires give and take for the relationship/marriage to develop to it's full potential. this may require some "management" where one is weak and the other is stronger. You apparently are stronger in a given area(s) than your husband and have to "carry him along" to make your marriage work at it's best. To carry it too far would be unhealthy manipulation, taking advantage of him to his hurt, Someone earlier mentioned feminism. In some ways feminism has been beneficial to society in general and marriage in particular. But taken to the extreme feminism creates a combativeness and contention. In a good sense women's role in the home and in society has been recognized and elevated.. Taken too far it has husbands and wives fighting instead of being supportive of each other; creates manipulation instead of a healthy tension or maybe management in an area where it is needed. Well, maybe I'm getting too wordy and besides I'm running out of time.

Depending on where you're located, it may be getting too late for RoundUp to be very effective. Plants/weeds need to be in active growth for it to be most efficient. Hand pulling is a lot of work, especially in gravel.......I'd consider torching (weed torch). Cleaning up, weeding, edging and mulching would be primary on my agenda. It will improve the appearance by 110%. And I'd do something about that walkway ASAP - it's a broken ankle just waiting to happen!! Ideally, I would raise the soil/lawn level but that might be more than you or your landlord are prepared to deal with. An alternative would be some sort of low, permanent planting along the walkway to give at least a sense of 'edge' to it and the psychological impression that you are not about to step off 6-8 inches!! And it's a mixed bag of opinions about improving rental property. After many years of being a homeowner and all the problems and expense that entails, I am now a renter as well but I always garden and plant any rental property I live at. My landlords have always been delighted that I bothered and typically discount the rent to some degree. But then I'm a die-hard gardener and a landscape designer so compelled to do what I can to make any property look better :-))

"There will definitely be some hiccups but could they be major?" Yes. "I would be hiring higher end well reviewed contractors throughout the process" Yes, and why exactly would these busy subs put the work of the General Contractors that give them several hundred thousand dollars worth of work every year behind for your onsie project? "Will there be contractors that mess things up and don't do things properly for the next trade to come in?" I promise. "Will there be things that are being done wrong and I won't even know?" Oh, you're going to know. You can't miss that big fat red tag the local division of inspection will post. "Once you have all blueprints are things relatively straight forward for each trade if they follow plan properly?" No. You have to know how to coordinate trades with each other. "Will trades or contractors not take me seriously and take advantage?" They'd be stupid not to. You're one little project one time. Who cares if you're angry and upset? What, you're not going to hire them for the next house you build twenty years from now? You have no relationships with subs. No relationships, no leverage. No leverage, big trouble.