Hi, there! Joe White here from Grow Property Management, your trusted property management company in Philadelphia.
All right, here’s the situation: the tenants are really upset because a squirrel or maybe squirrels have gotten into their ceiling and possibly even their living space. I completely understand how distressing that must be. No one wants to live with wildlife inside their home, and I don’t blame them for being frustrated. But from my perspective as a landlord and property investor, I know that handling this kind of thing isn’t always as fast or straightforward as tenants might expect.
The squirrels are entering the top part of the building around the eaves near the roof. That’s not just a pest control issue; it’s a structural one. So the first thing I did was send out a contractor, not an exterminator. That might sound odd to the tenants, but the reasoning is solid. We needed to identify and fix the physical openings in the structure, and that’s something only a contractor can properly handle. An exterminator can’t repair the building or close off entry points effectively.
Still, I do get the tenants’ perspective. They just want the animals gone now. They don’t want to hear about the process or the reasoning they’re living with a squirrel in their ceiling, and that’s understandably alarming. So yes, we also scheduled an exterminator. But here’s where the real disconnect happens: the tenants expect the squirrel to be removed immediately, and that’s just not realistic.
Removing wildlife from a structure like this is a process. You can’t simply walk in and ask the squirrel to leave. You can’t trap it inside either, because that could make things worse, like the squirrel panicking and entering the living space or even dying in the walls. That would obviously be horrible for both the tenants and the animal. The right way to do this involves a careful, step-by-step plan.
We’re likely looking at multiple visits from both the contractor and the exterminator. First, we have to find a way to trap the squirrel safely, maybe with bait, maybe using exclusion traps, and only once we’re sure the squirrel is gone can we close up the access points to prevent it from coming back. That’s not something that can be rushed, especially if the squirrel is getting in through a small, hard-to-reach hole under the roofline.
And yes, I know from experience that this kind of situation is deeply frustrating to tenants. They’re asking, “Why isn’t this fixed yet?” But the truth is, there is a process. And as landlords, we have to understand things tenants often don’t: that wildlife removal isn’t immediate, that structure matters, and that rushing could cause bigger problems.
At the end of the day, I’m doing everything I can: calling the right people, making sure multiple professionals are involved, and trying to keep everyone safe. It’s not perfect, and I get that. But sometimes, in rental property management, things are just more complicated than they look on the surface. This is one of those times. I’m just a humble Philadelphia property investment company owner, doing my best.
Thanks for sticking with me, and as always, happy rental property investing.
