It is not at all unreasonable to ask for a walk through, in fact many of my past land lords have recommended it. It MAY be required in your state IF you request it, something worth looking into.

Either way though…. The carpet thing, is typical, do it because if they do you’ll be paying about 4–5x what it costs. Make sure all the blinds are in great condition, stove is clean, walls clean, bathrooms working clean, etc.

When you’re completely done I would walk through with a video camera, and get good video of EVERYTHING, walls, carpet, doors, windows, blinds, stove, fridge, etc.

As far as getting your landlords attention, I would suggest leaving an e-mail and telling her that you find it very unprofessional that she hasn’t returned your correspondence, and that she changed the time of the walk through that you arranged (in fact a walk through a week early isn’t crazy at all, because that leaves time to fix problems). Threaten to report her to the BBB.

I would insist on it. If they won’t allow it, video tape the entire apartment prior to returning the keys so you won’t get bogus bills for repairs they are not really going to do.
By the way, I got charged 25.00 in my last apartment for not cleaning the drip pan under the fridge. Who knew they check the drip pan? Ok, I didn’t even know there was one under the fridge.

If she ends up really being a b*tch about it you could have a couple of sudden “accidental” last minute repairs…. maybe the fridge or the stove or something else thats incredibly expensive and they’re required to repair/replace suddenly just breaks for no reason.

Maintaining good paperwork on this matter and dealing with the BBB rather than causing any last-minute “accidental” repairs would be my advice.

I would also insist on it. See if the lease has any provision for it.

Can your daughter get a copy of their walk-thru checklist before she moves out, or does she have one from when she moved in? It might come in handy to see what it is that they will be checking.

And all of this effort seems wrong. The woman may be the manager, but surely she has a supervisor.

the lease states that the move out inspection must occur within 72 hours of the termination of the tenancy. The lease ends the end of the month, she provided written notice of being out the week prior and has to have the apartment cleaned and keys turned in by the date she gave. Is termination of tenancy the date she gave that she will be out and keys turned in or the last day of the lease? They could have workers in there etc who accidentaly cause spots on the carpet…

fortunately we do have the premove in checklist, we know what needs cleaned by their inspection, it just seems a move out inspection at move out time, rather than a week later makes sense

Take lots of pictures and see include them when you turn in the keys. Alternate solution, don’t turn in the keys until after the walk through.

I would call the person above the woman you are having trouble getting in touch with (even if it’s the person that actually owns the property).

If they do not have a walkthru before turning in the keys, I would video tape the apartment and then continue video taping as you walk over to the office to hand in the keys (to show a continuous time period between when you took the video of the apartment and when you went to the office to turn in the keys.