How do I clear a rental of pests between tenants?

Turnover is the best time to treat. Empty rooms are easier to inspect and treat, nobody has to move their things, and you can check the results before anyone moves in. Done properly, the new tenant starts with a clear home and you have a record that shows it.

The worry is obvious: the new tenant finds them in week one, and the relationship starts badly. The answer is to treat, check, and keep the paperwork.

The checklist

1. Find out what you are dealing with. Read any reports from the last tenancy, look for droppings, egg cases and shed skins, and get a pest controller to confirm the species. See droppings and egg cases.
2. Bed bugs: always a professional. An inspection of the flat and the ones around it, heat or chemical treatment, and a follow-up visit. Do not hand over keys until the follow-up is done.
3. Cockroaches: a professional, or gel bait and an insect growth regulator used exactly as the label says. Some products can only be sold or used in certain countries, and some places require a licensed pest controller for rented homes, so check before you do it yourself. The German cockroach guide explains the plan.
4. Deep clean the hiding places: behind and under the cooker and fridge, inside cupboards and drawers, grease along the splashback.
5. Seal the gaps around pipes, behind kickboards, along skirting boards and around drains. See sealing gaps.
6. Check the flats next door. Ask the neighbours or the building manager. If the source is next door, your flat will fill up again.
7. Leave monitor traps out for the empty weeks and read them before handover. Write down the dates and counts. See how to use monitor traps.
8. Keep the report from the pest controller and your trap record together.
9. Tell the new tenant how to report anything they see, and that you would rather hear early.

Furniture the last tenant left behind

With bed bugs, furniture often does not need to go, and treatment can save it. If something does go, wrap it in plastic before carrying it through shared halls, and mark it clearly so nobody takes it home from the kerb. See do I have to throw out the mattress.

Pests in the new tenant’s boxes

If you spot cockroaches in a new tenant’s belongings before they have fully moved in, stay calm and kind. They may not know, and it could have happened anywhere. Ask them to keep the boxes closed and together in one place, ideally away from the kitchen, until a pest controller has looked. Unpacking outside or in a garage, box by box, helps.

Write down what you found and when, with photos, and keep the monitor traps going after they move in. Leave the question of cost for later, after advice.

When bed bugs have spread to a neighbour

Treat both flats, and check the ones on either side, above and below. Use the same pest controller and the same dates where you can, so the bugs have nowhere untreated to move to. Give each household the preparation list in writing and keep a record of who was treated when. Our answer on what to do when a tenant reports pests has more on handling occupied flats.

The label wins: follow it on every product, including how long rooms stay empty and how to air them. If the new tenant has a baby, pets or asthma, tell them what was used and when, in writing, so they can ask their doctor or vet if they are worried.

Whether you must tell a new tenant about a past problem depends on where you let. Honesty usually saves trouble, and a pest controller’s report showing the work is a good thing to hand over. For the rules on disclosure and on who pays, ask your housing authority, the council or a landlords’ association.