Below I’ve put together the main factors about pet friendly rentals you should consider before marketing your rental condo:

We strongly suggest allowing 1 pet up to 35lbs for the following reasons:

  1. Around 45% of prospective tenants have pets, and 70% of prospective tenants with pets have 1 small pet under 35lbs. This means having a “pet friendly apartment” gives you access to nearly 90% of the prospective tenant market. Without is a crippling 55%
  2. You get to collect an additional 1/2 month’s rent as a pet deposit on top of the 1/2 month’s rent for a security deposit if the tenant has a pet
  3. The damage + pet deposit covers a good amount of damage which you would catch during a tenancy on one of your bi-annual inspections. This allows you much more leverage to collect the money, get the issues repaired during the tenancy, etc.
  4. We find that prospective tenants without pets apply more often at pet friendly homes. The reason is speculative, however, they think that their application will stand out against the ones with pets, therefore getting you more than 50% of applications without pets
  5. You can always choose an application without a pet over one with a pet
  6. Pet damage comes from tenants who do not take responsibility for their pets. These are generally tenants who cannot afford to repair things or get the pet the help it needs to get over behavioural issues, etc. Basically, bad pets come from bad tenants. If you don’t have a bad tenant because you know how to screen properly (checkout our post on that topic), there is little to worry about as far as having a pet in the home.

We do not suggest posting without pets and then changing to with pets to generate more interest. It’s one or the other out of the gate. Looking forward to any other comments on this topic as we always like seeing other perspectives on these very critical rental property decisions.

Of course, we run into the following reasons to not have a pet friendly rental all the time:

  • General fear of animals
  • Allergic
  • Already had a bad experience with a pet friendly rental
  • You just don’t want pets in your rental

Strictly financially speaking, we would advise against it. The decision is ultimately up to you.

No matter where you are in BC, Landlords are permitted to restrict pets in their rental property.

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*The above information is not to be relied on as legal advice. If you require professional or legal advise for your personal circumstances, please reach out to us for a referral, or consult with us for property management services.

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