Unit Turnover Checklist Alberta: A Step by Step Guide

Vacancy is the most expensive line in any turnover, and it is almost never caused by the work itself. It is caused by the order the work happens in.

A suite that sits four extra days waiting on a painter, then two more waiting on a cleaner who could not book until the paint was done, has lost a week of rent to scheduling. The checklist below is ordered the way the trades actually stack.

Step 1. Move out inspection and documentation

Inspect the unit the day the tenant leaves, before anything is touched. Once your own crews have been through it you have lost the ability to separate tenant damage from turnover work, and with it any deduction you were planning to make.

• Photograph every room, wide first and then close. Time stamps on, date visible.

• Photograph inside appliances, under sinks, behind the toilet, and the full floor of every closet.

• Record meter readings, and note which keys, fobs, mailbox keys and garage remotes came back.

• Describe damage specifically. A burn mark 5cm across on the bedroom carpet under the window is usable. Carpet damaged is not.

• Flag anything needing a trade before the cleanout starts, so you can book it today rather than on day three.

Alberta requires a written inspection report at both move-in and move-out, with specific rules about timing and who must be present. Treat that as a legal obligation that happens to produce useful evidence, rather than the other way around.

Two people should see the unit at this stage, or one person twice on different days. Fresh eyes catch the things a first walkthrough misses: a slow drain, a window that will not latch, a soft spot in the subfloor under the carpet you are about to pull.

Build the punch list here, in one document, before anybody quotes anything. A scope written after the cleanout is a scope written twice, and suite clean up in Edmonton gets priced very differently depending on whether the list existed beforehand.

Step 2. Cleanout and disposal

Empty the unit completely before any trade arrives. A painter working around abandoned furniture charges more, works slower and does worse work, and a cleaner cannot sign off a floor they were never able to reach.

• Everything the tenant left behind, unless Alberta's rules on abandoned goods apply. If they do, stop and follow the notice and storage process before disposing of anything.

• Window coverings that are stained, bent or sun-rotted. Replacing beats cleaning on almost every blind.

• Old filters, dead bulbs, spent batteries, and the entire contents of the storage locker.

• Carpet and underlay if they are coming out. Pulling them now exposes the subfloor while the repair trades are still scheduled.

Book the disposal as a single haul rather than a run of trips. A cleanout bagged into a residential cart over two collection cycles is two weeks of vacancy, which is why junk removal in Edmonton on the same day as the move-out inspection pays for itself on the first suite.

Step 3. Repairs, paint and trades

This is the only stage with real dependencies, and it generates almost all the lost days in a turnover. Run the trades in sequence, and book every one of them on day one rather than as each finishes.

1. Anything that opens a wall or a floor: plumbing, electrical, flooring removal.

2. Drywall patching and sanding.

3. Flooring installation, if your jobs run flooring before paint. Installers and painters will each argue for going first, so pick an order and keep it consistent across the building so crews know what to expect.

4. Paint: ceilings, then walls, then trim.

5. Fixtures, hardware, blinds and appliances back in.

Keep one paint colour and one product across the whole building. Spot repairs stop requiring a full wall, and you stop storing eight partial cans that match nothing.

Larger scopes need deciding before the unit goes vacant rather than discovering mid-turnover. Flooring replacement, kitchen work and bathroom work belong in a planned renovation and restoration schedule, because dropping them into a turnover converts a four day job into a three week one that nobody budgeted vacancy for.

Step 4. Deep clean

Clean once, after every trade has finished. A unit cleaned before the painter arrives gets cleaned twice, billed twice, and still shows drywall dust along the baseboards at the first showing.

• Appliances inside and out, including behind and underneath the fridge and stove.

• Inside cupboards and drawers, tops of cabinets, and the range hood filter.

• Bathrooms down to the grout, including the exhaust fan cover.

• Windows, tracks, sills and any window coverings that stayed.

• Baseboards, door frames, light switches, outlet covers and vents.

• Floors last. Carpet shampooed, hard floors stripped of construction residue.

• Balcony or patio, including the drain.

Post-construction cleaning and move-out cleaning are different jobs at different rates. If there was drywall work, say so when you book. Otherwise you will get a move-out clean and a dust film on every horizontal surface in the suite.

Step 5. Final inspection and re-list

Walk the unit against the original punch list rather than against a general impression. Every line either gets ticked or gets a written reason it did not.

• Test every outlet, tap, drain and light.

• Run every appliance through a cycle.

• Test smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors, fit new batteries, and record the date.

• Check that every window and door opens, closes and locks.

• Confirm a new furnace filter is in, and note the size somewhere the next tenant will find it.

• Photograph the finished unit in the same order as the move-out photos. Those become your listing photos and your next move-in baseline.

• Rekey or recode, then reconcile the key inventory against what you handed out.

List before the work finishes, not after. A unit two days from ready can be shown and can be leased. A unit that goes up on the day it is finished has already lost every showing it could have held during the final week.

The sequencing mistake that adds a week

Serial booking. Most landlords call the next trade when the current one finishes, which builds every contractor's lead time into the vacancy instead of overlapping them.

Each call adds that trade's availability to your empty unit. Three trades booked serially on two day lead times is six days of waiting inside a job containing maybe three days of actual work.

Book all of it on the day you write the punch list. Give each trade a window rather than a fixed date, tell them what has to be finished before they arrive, and tell them who is coming in behind them. Crews sequence themselves perfectly well once they know the order.

The second mistake is a scope that grows. Decide before the unit is empty whether this is a refresh or an upgrade, and hold that line. Discovering on day three that the kitchen really should be redone does not add three days to the schedule, it restarts it, and the vacancy cost of that decision rarely gets counted against the upgrade when someone works out whether it was worth doing.

Coordinating that is most of the value in professional unit turnover services, and it explains why an identical scope takes five days for one owner and two weeks for another.

A realistic timeline

Those are working days with trades booked in parallel. Booked one at a time, add roughly half again to every row.

Frequently asked questions

What should be on a unit turnover checklist in Alberta?

A move-out inspection with photographs, a full cleanout and disposal, repairs and paint run in sequence, a single deep clean after the trades, and a final inspection against the original punch list. The written move-in and move-out inspection reports are a legal requirement in Alberta, not an optional extra.

How long should a suite turnover take?

A light refresh runs two to three working days. A standard turnover with a full clean, patch and paint usually runs four to seven. Anything involving flooring replacement or heavy drywall work moves into the ten to fifteen day range.

Should I clean before or after painting?

After. One deep clean once every trade has finished costs less than two partial cleans, and it is the only one that produces a showable unit. Tell the cleaner there was drywall work so you get a post-construction clean rather than a standard move-out clean.

Can I list a unit before the turnover is finished?

Yes, and you should. Listing two or three days before completion lets you book showings while the final trades are still working, instead of starting from zero on the day the unit is ready.

What causes most of the delay in a suite turnover?

Booking trades one at a time. Every call adds that contractor's lead time to your vacancy. Booking everything on the day the punch list is written, with each trade given a window and told who precedes them, removes most of the waiting.

None of this is difficult work. The entire discipline is deciding the scope before the unit is empty and booking everything on day one.

This article is general information and not legal advice. Alberta's Residential Tenancies Act sets specific requirements for inspection reports, security deposits and abandoned property.

Spartan Enhanced runs suite turnovers across Edmonton with trades booked in parallel and photographic proof at every stage. Call 780-935-9243 or email [email protected] to get a scope priced.