More frustration - but at least some good news, too

Shortly after we made the arrangements for our move, there were a few things we were told that would have made things quite a bit easier, as far as the details of actually moving go. I was told we should have the last 5 days of the month to move in, for starters.

Well, that's not quite working out. At first, I expected we'd get the keys on the 24th. Then my husband talked to them and was told the 25th. This morning, I got a call and found that we get our keys after a move in inspection, which we have to book for the 26th.

It seems that so much work has been needed to finish this unit, it won't be until the 25th that they'll have a company come in to clean the ducts.

Here's the frustration. When I gave our notice to our current landlords, the final date we have this place is the 28th. Now, from previous moves out of apartments, I've encountered situations where tenant one has to be out by noon on the 1st, so that tenant two can move in after noon on the same day. So having a move out date of the 28th... well, it's a good thing we have an empty place to move into.

Then we got a note from the landlord talking about, among other things, the move out inspection. We were given a choice of two time slots in two days. The 27th and the 28th! And both time slots were in the morning.

We don't even have the elevator booked until the early evening of the 27th. How on earth are we supposed to have a move-out inspection before we've moved out?

We're booked for the later time slot on the 28th. It's still going to be tight. We've got a cleaning list and, while it's pretty basic (sad, that they have to go so far as tell people they need to replace burnt out light bulbs), it's a lot of work, even with an empty apartment. Since the inspection is on the morning after move out, we'll have to come back late in the day, just to clean the place. Sure, we can do some of it in advance, but some of it will have to wait until the place is empty. Oh, and we're supposed to hire a company to do a professional carpet cleaning. No home rentals and doing it ourselves. They do give the option of letting them book it for us, for a set fee. We'll be going that route. I have to find out if that will come out of our damage deposit.

Which is another frustration. In the 3 years we've been on this floor, we are the only ones *still* here. Every other apartment on this floor has seen multiple tenants during this time. Some apartments, like the one directly across from our door, has seen as many as 5 different tenants. Granted, some of these are internal moves - people moving to different apartments within the complex - but that's still a high turnover.

So we've have plenty of opportunity to see what goes on in between tenants. Some apartments have needed renovations, so they obviously were empty for a while. Nothing like that is going to happen with us, though. There's already another tenant listed for our apartment! I am guessing it's another internal move, since they've never shown the place.

With a quick turnover like this, we have often seen the building maintenance staff cleaning the apartments after the tenants have left. Not just a professional carpet cleaning, but basic washing of floors and walls, etc. Plenty of people leave without doing ANY cleaning.

Now, I can't bring myself to do that, but at the same time, going through this list, I don't see how we'll have the energy to do so thorough a cleaning right after we've finished moving into our new place, then be back for a morning inspection.

Since I have to call them about the carpet cleaning anyhow, I think I'll ask about the damage deposit, and if I can just use that to pay for cleaning. :-/

The good news, at least, is that we now have set dates and mostly set times. I still have to hear back from the person I have to book a move in inspection with. I've left a message. I was told that, if I can't get through to her, I should call back the office and I'll get booked with someone else. We can book the inspection for early on the 26th, get the keys, and we're done. We can start moving in right away. The girls and I will make at least a few trips to get some boxes and bins out. I will probably empty at least one of the bins out so we can use it to move refrigerator contents.

*sigh*

Had things gone the way they were supposed to, we'd be doing a move in inspection and getting the keys tomorrow instead of 3 days from now.

Ah, well. We'll manage. It's not like we have much choice.