Am I being an asshole landlord? →[More:]So I have a couple of tenants, who recently reported a problem in their main bathroom. When I investigated it, it turned out to be fairly serious and as a result, would require a complete re-tiling of said bathroom.

My tenants insisted on using no one else but the one handyman I hire with whom they were familiar. They expected him to work according to a schedule when either one or both of the occupants of the residence would be home. This meant working well into the night and on weekends. My handyman balked at this. He told me he didn't mind working into the weekend OR well into the night. But not both. This, I understood.

I communicated this to my tenants, one of whom got very perplexed as to why my guy wouldn't work whenever she dictated (or rather, when *I* as the person paying him told him to work). I told her that we were lucky to have my guy, as no contractor I trusted would work such a schedule, and would in fact demand unfettered access to the house 8-5 Monday thru Friday to get the job done.

So, we compromise. My handyman gets his weekends, but must work into the evening, though not as many hours as one tenant would have liked. As with any major remodeling job, problems have cropped up, including my guy being sick this last Friday. When I informed my tenant that he'd be back on Monday, and offered my apologies for the small delays we've encountered thus far, I could tell she was quite angry, though her roommate seemed fine with everything.

Today I call her to remind her that everything's back on track. She blows up at me, telling me that she's been upset with me since I first started "throwing (my) authority around as a landlord", by "threatening" to come into the house whenever I wanted, hiring whoever I wanted without any input from her.

I was more than shocked. I never felt at any time I was being antagonistic, and in fact thought we had achieved a compromise in which the tenants got most of what they wanted, my handyman was happy, and that the job was proceeding as quickly as possible given the circumstances.

I calmed her down some, but she kept repeating "I'm very unhappy." I don't know what else to do or say to alleviate her unhappiness and am quite tempted to challenge her to find a landlord more willing to work with her to meet her unusual working hours, her need to be onsite during the job, and who actually picks up the phone or answers e-mail in a timely fashion.

I've been a renter. It's been my experience that when a major remodel has to be done, it's customary to accommodate whoever the landlord hires to do the work. You either give the landlord permission to let the workers into the house, or you do it yourself and that's really all that's required of you as a tenant until the job's done. The landlord doesn't have to, if they don't want to, take into consideration whether or not you want to be there or what hours you work as long as they're reasonable about it.

I feel I'm being reasonable with my tenants. At least one tenant is making me feel like an asshole landlord. Renterbunnies ... what do you think?