What's The Best Carpet for a Rental?

So what is the best carpet for a rental?

Well, cheap of course!!!!!  I guess that goes without being said but there are differing reasons for certain types of carpet. This will be based mainly on what type of perspective renters you will have living in your house, condo or apartment.

There are mainly 4 types of renters.

1. Low risk people that will be staying for years (long term renters)
2. Low risk people that will be staying for a short time (short time renters)
3. High risk people that will be staying for a long time (long term renters)
4. High risk people that normally don't stay long at all (short time renters)

Most styles of carpet will not wear out. They will ugly out (mat down, untwisting of the yarns, tip blossom etc) long before they will wear out. And in the case of rentals, most carpet will get stained, ripped or torn long before they wear out. These are general statements that will vary depending on the quality of carpet you have installed and the type of renter you have.

Okay, let's take each scenario one at a time shall we?

1. Low risk long term renter: You can usually spend a little more in this instance because most low risk, long term renters will treat your rental unit like their very own. They know that they are going to stay for a long time and want to live in a nice place so they will normally take very good care of your carpet. In this case what you want is a carpet that has stain protection (accidents still happen!) and can withstand years of wear. So a medium grade/medium priced carpet that is a great value with built in stain protection is the best in this case.

2. Low risk short term renter: These people, even though they won't be staying long, still will take very good care of your carpet. They are inherently clean people that want to live in a nice place! With these folks you will hopefully be able to reuse the carpet after they move out. So you will get more than one use out of your carpet. So again, a medium grade/ medium priced carpet should do the trick. You will get years of use out of your carpet and shouldn't have to change it for a long time.

Rental Unit Carpet Abuse

3. High risk long term renter: Putting in a medium grade/ medium priced carpet in this instance may or may not pan out for you. They make stain, mutilate and otherwise destroy this carpet in a relatively short time and since they are staying for a long time they will want the carpet replaced as a condition for them to stay. You know as well as I do that sometimes renters can be hard to find. A rental sitting empty is just money lost. So you may find yourself replacing carpet long before you should have to. So in this case a low quality/ low priced carpet with great stain resistance is a must (probably a polyester carpet in varying degrees of quality). That way the carpet may ugly out fast but at least it won't be stained. In these instances you can usually avoid having to replace the carpet early.

4. High risk short term renter: This type of renter knows they aren't staying long and don't really care if they mess up the existing carpet. These instances usually call for constant carpet replacements. The carpet doesn't wear out, mat down, ugly out or anything like that but it will usually be abused badly. Stains, rips, tears etc. Since you will never get the wear out of the carpet in this situation, the quality of carpet is irrelevant. Stain protection is still a must but if you buy a polyester carpet or olefin carpet, you can get high stain resistance at a low cost.

So not all rental situations are created equal and each specific instance has different solutions. Carpet is not rocket science but there are sound reasons behind every different scenario. With rentals you want to make money and keeping your floor replacement costs low will help insure this. Going cheap is not always the best way. Matching up the flooring to each different rental scenario will help insure that you make the right choice.

Jeff Dean
Dover Floor Covering
http://www.doverfloorcovering.com