Apartment Living With Your Dog

MSN Dog Central ^ | September 29, 2006 | Sandy Robins

[libstripper]

One sure sign that a downtown neighborhood is becoming a fashionable place to live—more than just a commercial district—is the number of dogs out and about on the sidewalks. Today, many apartment buildings and individual landlords are developing increasingly lenient pet policies to attract more dog owners to these newly gentrified urban areas.

There’s no question that city living offers many on-tap conveniences that make it an attractive alternative to a suburban lifestyle. But how dog friendly is downtown? There is much more to consider when it comes to your pal’s well-being than the landlord’s consent or the homeowner policy confirming that pets are welcome.

advertisementSeeking Out Pet Friendly Buildings Whether you are looking to rent or buy, the best way to find out if the neighborhood is dog friendly is to take your dog for a walk and stop to talk to anyone else out walking their dog.

Many realtors are now paying special attention to the pet-loving sector of the apartment housing market. So it’s a good idea to seek out someone who specializes in such properties. Veterinarian offices, groomers and pet stores are also a mine of information and many have notice boards with postings of suitable apartments in the area.

[DugwayDuke]

"I see people living in downtown Atlanta loft apartments with huge dogs - mastiffs and Great Danes"

I've owned both mastiffs and great danes. They were completely inside dogs. Both make wonderful apartment dogs. They have the metabolism of a rock. A short walk once a day is all it takes to make them happy. A typical day is move from the couch to the love seat. Take a nap. Move from the love seat to the bed. Take a nap. Move from the bed to the couch. Take a nap. Repeat.

BTW, they make wonderful afternoon nap buddies. They are experts at afternoon naps.

[mom4kittys]

I have a friend that has a great dane. Exactly like you described. Isn't it funny how people get hung up on the size of an animal?

[wmfights]

"It won't do a thing to the polyurethane, just sits there."
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The poyurethane is probably the best, but the wood expands when humid and contracts when dry so the spacing between the boards will separate over time. When a dog urinates the urine will seep between the cracks and stain the wood. Sometimes the wood can be sanded, but after a 5-6 sandings the wood will have to be replaced. If you replace a small section the wood will not match the old wood. Also, when you patch the wood the thickness of the boards may vary from the rest of the floor. If you stain the entire floor to cover the damaged portion you darken the entire room, making it less attractive to perspective tenants.

Replacing a hardwood floor and having it resurfaced will cost approx $8-10.00 per sg. foot. If I have to redo 500 sg. ft. at $8.00 per foot that will be $4,000.00 just for the floor. How does a $400.00 deposit cover this, or the additional vacancy time to get the work done?

[AnAmericanMother]

Regular inspection, sir. Regular inspection.

Almost any lease gives you the right to do so. You can use repairs as an excuse if you need to.

Interesting point, though. We've been in our current house for 10 years, it's 25 years old. The polyurethane was sanded down and refinished around 1990. It has not separated or cracked at all, and the boards have separated in only one place -- at a threshold between two rooms.

Before that, we lived in our old house from 1981 to 1994, and I never had separation between any boards. Of course, that was a waxed floor, so I had to be careful and renew the wax frequently to prevent stains (and I wasn't always careful, esp. in the kitchen, it got away from me in a couple of places. Which is why I prefer the poly.)

Both houses were not spec houses but custom (we built the first one ourselves) with oversized joists and short spacing between the joists, which probably has something to do with it.

[AnAmericanMother]

The Great Dane I know is a very quiet girl.

My Labs are field line (one on site, one coming Wednesday!) and they are most definitely NOT.

"Afternoon nap? What's that? Why are you lying there when there are squirrels to chase and doves to bark at? Here, let me help you off the sofa!" < tug, tug, tug, bark, bark, bark >

[wmfights]

Regular inspection, sir. Regular inspection.

Almost any lease gives you the right to do so. You can use repairs as an excuse if you need to.
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I understand you aren't in this business, so I'll try to explain. This is a business and the way you make money is by not having turn over. If we had time to inspect all the units the tenants would find it intrusive. Also, if upon doing an inspection we determined that the floors needed to be done how do you do this with a tenant in the apartment? Also, the smell until the polyurethane drys 12-24 hrs is very hard to live with. All these factors, tenant irritation, smell and impracticality of doing the work in an occupied unit leads to a simple solution NO PETS.

There is no way to determine who is going to be a responsible pet owner and who isn't. Eviction is a long expensive process and you lose good tenants who don't want to be around the problem during the process.

What we are seeing now is pet friendly buildings are have occupancy problems because pet owners are finding these buildings have aggressive animals in them and the buildings are not as well maintained. I know because I get calls from pet owners all the time and they tell me.

[AnAmericanMother]

I'm not sure where you are, but in GA landlords have it easy. Eviction is a VERY simple process before a magistrate.

I took a course once on "tenant's rights" - short answer, they ain't got any, not in Georgia anyhow.

You send the guy in to change the light bulbs or the furnace filter, he smells urine or faeces, you issue a warning if you like . . . or just start the eviction process. Excess turnover is certainly an issue, but who says a pet deposit has to be $400? One month's rent? Judgment for the excess damages?

I'm not in the real property rental business (don't have the patience or the temper for it) but my husband used to assist at evictions in his younger and wilder days (he and another large young man would accompany the petite 98 pound landlord when she served the notices, just to head off any trouble) so I've had a ringside seat, so to speak.

[wmfights]

"I took a course once on "tenant's rights" - short answer, they ain't got any, not in Georgia anyhow."
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I'm in the socialist republic of Chicago. Landlord's have no rights. You have to be very careful screening because once they're in even with non-payment it can take 6+ months to get them out and will cost $1,500+.

There was a time when you could serve a ten day notice and the judge would throw them out immediately, but they won't even consider it anymore. FWIW, a 5 day notice is for non-payment, a 10 day notice is very creating problems ie. loud dog, stereo, not taking garbage down etc..

[AnAmericanMother]

Wow - it's a fur piece from CHI to GA . . . in more ways than one.

Around here, the market tends to take care of this sort of problem. The people with problem dogs go live in a dump with the other problem tenants, responsible dog owners live in middle-of-the-road places (or rent a house with a fenced back yard - you can actually find one pretty cheap), and the high-end folks rent one of the really expensive chi-chi places where they don't allow dogs OR children.

[wmfights]

"Wow - it's a fur piece from CHI to GA . . . in more ways than one."
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In the high density parts of Chicago, you don't see much grass other than at parks or in the parkway between the sidewalk and the street. The phenomenon of the dogs in these areas is new. It really started up about 20-15 years ago when the suburban kids began moving to the city. More and more landlords are like myself where we have thrown up our hands and said no more, NO PETS. So the "dog people" as we call them are either in condo's or less well maintained buildings.

The dog parks were created to try and keep the dogs off the baseball/football/soccer fields that the kids use. The dog owners seem to think that children rolling around in dog urine and feces is okay. Even though these parks are marked, no dogs, the yuppies seem to think it doesn't apply to them.

[Dysart]

I lived in apts from the age of 18 and always had at least one dog with me. They seemed very content with living in the apt as they always went on walks or runs with me in the evening. But I always longed for a nice house and expansive, fenced backyard to provide them. I was able to do that 7 years ago.

Now, in the morning before I head off to the office as they anxiously wait at the back door, I let them inside from their morning duties. And there they happily lounge until I return. My dogs firmly believe that backyards are overrated and apts really aren't so bad if communal living is your bag. And I'm not talking Poodles or Pomeranians here, either.

I think the key to successful living with dogs in apts is to ensure that they get plenty of daily exercise. There are a few breeds such as Border Collies/Australian Shepards that I wouldn't dream of keeping in an apt though.

[brytlea]

My dogs wish we still lived on 2.5 acres in rural TX. Unfortunately here in S. FL, even with a house, the size of the yard makes this about like apt. living. Sadly.
susie

[brytlea]

This is almost like apt. living. Our backyard is like a postage stamp, so we have to take walks. There is a dog park, but I've been a little afraid to take the girls there. They would probably enjoy it.
susie

[AnAmericanMother]

Our backyard isn't all that big. The way back of our yard is flood plain, so it can't be fenced, it would all wash away!

The dog has a back yard that's about 75 feet by 50 feet -- not much for an active retriever. She has a figure 8 path mapped out so she can run pretty fast, but she can't get up to top speed.

Fortunately, there's a huge polo field down by the river about 1 mile away from the house, since she's E-collar conditioned now I can just let her run. She can get some real speed on if I get my kids to slingshot a bumper at the other end of a 200 yard field!

[AnAmericanMother]

BTW, I would stay away from dog parks.

The ones around here are outrageous - the gangstas bring their pit bulls and scare everybody to death, most dogs are untrained and just run wild. They're crowded, too small, and always dirty and torn up.

Most folks have a place they go, like our local polo field or a regular park. There's a park up the road where a lot of our friends go to train -- in the back of the park behind the maintenance buildings there's a big open field and a pond where nobody usually goes. The maintenance men don't mind if we train back there, so long as we pick up any dog deposits and take our dead ducks with us!

[brytlea]

Yeah, in TX I could always find places to run the dogs, even when we lived in Midland in the city (well, ok, we thought of it as a city!). But here, there are not many places you can take your dog off leash. We do alot of walks, but I know they wuld like a good run (which I am too old and uncoordinated to do with them on leash! ;)
Our back yard is about the lenghth of the house (don't know that in yards, but the house is only 1800 sf) and maybe 12 ft. deep. Not alot of space. The little one loves to run jets around the yard, she's pretty amazing. I should have her in agility.
susie

[AnAmericanMother]

If you get her into agility, the club should have a big, open training field! Our club has a huge fenced yard, big enough for a standard agility ring (110 x 85), plus an indoor training area for when it rains - not quite as big, but it's in a warehouse, probably about 85 x 50.

[MeneMeneTekelUpharsin]

My apartment is not living with my dog.

[brytlea]

Well, she's not quite 6 months old yet, so not quite old enough to do agility. Darn... ;)
susie

[AnAmericanMother]

You should look into whether your local agility club offers a "puppy class". Ours does.

No jumping, but lots of clicker training, obedience, and obstacle familiarization with the jumps set on the bottom rung (4 inches isn't going to hurt a puppy!)

As soon as The Puppy to Be Named Later arrives (this Wednesday! Rah! Rah!) she's going to be in the puppy class, which just started a couple of weeks ago. I'll run her at 7, then run the Shelley Dog at 8.

The name of choice at the moment is Candlewood Rock 'n' Roll Ruby, with Candlewood Give My Love to Rose and Candlewood Black Cadillac as runners-up.