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Five Signs You Might Be a Bad Landlord

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Are you a bad landlord?
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We can’t all be the perfect landlord (I know I’m not as much as I try!), but there are definitely a few sign that could indicate  you could be heading down the path of becoming a bad landlord.

If you recognize one of these signs, you should be ok. Just correct the problem and you should be able to ditch that bad landlord stigma.

If you recognize two or three of these signs in how you’re running your landlording you’re going to have to make a decision about where you’re heading. You can continue down the pathway towards being a bad landlord, or you can do a bit of a course correction and straighten yourself out.

Finally, if you see four or five of these traits showing up continually with your rentals, it’s time to sell. You’re giving the good landlords a bad name and it’s time for you to move on!

Are you ready to find out about these signs?

Sign #1 You Might Be a Bad Landlord

No Written Leases

Listen, you need a written lease and you need it signed by all the tenants residing in your property.

If you don’t have a written lease you’re leaving yourself open to misunderstandings, potential problems and a ton of ambiguity.

Your written lease should address potential issues before they become issues such as rules regarding smoking, pets and even subletting (where allowed, some areas the “rules” don’t let you dictate what is always allowed or not allowed).

It should break down responsibilities for snow removal, grass cutting and property maintenance where applicable. And it should include what the repercussions for transgressing those rules specifically are.

It should cover all those details that could be rather vague, unless they are pointed out and it needs to protect you as much as possible within the local laws that govern landlord and tenant rules.

By not having your lease signed it’s just as good as not having one and the big problem is situations without written leases become a situation of he said/she said. This ends up being a situation where there is no proof you originally told them it was non-smoking, or that they couldn’t start a rabbit breeding factory in the spare bedroom (no pet policy).

So if you’re serious about being a landlord and you don’t have leases in place, go find some.

It may involve spending a bit of money with a lawyer or it may involve buying them from a local landlord association. Whatever you spend will pay for itself time after time and year after year going forward by reducing problems, headaches and even evictions when things do go bad.

Sign #2 You Might Be a Bad Landlord

You Haven’t Inspected Your Property In Over A Year

visit your rentals every six monthsIdeally you’re visiting your property and doing at least a quick inspection every three to six months, but worst case you need to at least get in there yearly, even if they seem like great tenants!

A lot can go wrong in a year, heck a lot can go wrong in three months!

That beautifully renovated property with the new carpet and high end hardwood may need to be replaced if you find out your tenant has been rebuilding his leaking motorbike on it over the winter months.

The little leak underneath the kitchen sink that the tenant didn’t catch could require completely gutting the kitchen and replacing everything. And these are the obvious things you’ll notice just by visiting and taking a peek!

With quarterly or every six month visits you can replace furnace filters which will extend the life of your furnace, you can replace smoke detector batteries which could save lives and your property and you can even notice potential problems that could grow into huge problems if left un repaired.

If you haven’t visited a rental property of yours in the last six months stop reading now and start scheduling a visit before continue on! Don’t be a bad landlord or a landlord who suddenly has to deal with a very expensive repair in the near future!

Sign #3 You Might Be A Bad Landlord

You Refer To Your Property as “It’s Only A Rental”

If you’re referring to your rental property, your expensive investment, as “it’s only a rental property” you’re setting yourself up for failure.

If you’re creating a mental environment where you’re not thinking of your property as someone’s home, where you’re potentially allowing sub standard work, lower grade finishes and even ramshackle repairs to be done, you’re setting yourself up for failure. And that’s what happens if your property is just a rental.

When you start referring to your property as only a rental you’ve already established you don’t care about it and it’s not long before it starts to become neglected (refer to Sign #2).

It’s too much work to go inspect it, it’s too much expense to do proper repairs (after all it’s just a rental) and in no time flat you start seeing your tenant turnover sky rocket and your vacant periods increase.

Then after a year or two of losing money you become another one of those landlords who say Real Estate doesn’t work and sell off your potential asset.

It’s not just a rental it’s a long term investment that can reward you handsomely over time and with proper care and attention. Remember that, or save yourself time and start planning to get out now.

Sign #4 You Might Be a Bad Landlord

You Ignore Your Tenants

return tenant calls promptlyThere’s nothing as annoying as getting interrupted when you’re out having a nice evening out with a spouse or girlfriend or even your family. It’s worse when it’s your tenant calling about a problem with the furnace, in minus 20 degree weather.

At least until you realize that because you have that rental property you’re able to have a nice evening out, or that you have a few extra creature comforts, like heat, because you’re setting yourself up for long term success.

It’s freezing out and they don’t have heat so you need to get on that and not ignore it!

OK, that’s one of the worst case scenarios, but even if it’s something simple like a broken dishwasher, clogged sink or slow drain in the bath tub, they shouldn’t be ignored.

How you handle situations with your tenant can directly affect how long your tenant stays with you and if you keep them happy by dealing with issues in a timely manner they will stay much much longer!

If you can reduce tenant turnover to once every few years it will make a direct impact on your bottom line.

Tenant turnover leads to vacant months with no rental income, extra time spent on advertising and meeting prospective tenants and money flowing out of your pocket as you cover expenses related to the property like water, heat, insurance, taxes and mortgage payments with money out of your bank account.

Even if you don’t have an answer, don’t leave your tenants hanging. I currently have a tenant in a property about two hours from me with plumbing issues (not a water leak, but a shortage of hot water, probably a tank that simply needs flushing).
I don’t have an answer right now, but I’ve replied back to her that I should have an update later this afternoon. I’m keeping her in the loop, I’m acknowledging there is an issue and I’m addressing it and she knows I’m not ignoring her!

So don’t ignore your tenants. If you keep them happy and keep them satisfied you’re a good landlord, not a bad landlord who can’t be reached, you’ll be rewarded with longer term tenants and more cash flowing into your bank accounts!

Sign #5 You Might Be a Bad Landlord

You Don’t Treat It Like a Business

I bring this up a lot, mostly because it’s important, but also because failing to treat your landlording like a business can lead to you failing. And failing with property can be an expensive lesson.

The more you treat the entire rental business as exactly a business the more you’ll do to set up the proper practices to help you succeed.

This can involve moving from using a simple spreadsheet to track your income and expenses to moving to dedicated software of customized accounting systems that allow you to track and control much more of your business.

It involves moving from picking a tenant cause they seem nice to having a proper system in place to screen tenants, places to acquire credit and criminal reports as necessary and understanding the local laws regarding rentals and how they apply.

If you treat it haphazardly you make mistakes, or take shortcuts and those mistakes and shortcuts cost you dearly. I’ve seen landlords use free leases they found online that were invalid because they didn’t refer to local laws.

I had a landlord try and evict a tenant using an eviction form from the incorrect state (it gave the tenant another free month of rent as he had to resubmit the correct form after the fact).

These are the shortcuts that backfire on you and are another reason that can cause you to quit the rental business.

Set yourself up for success.

Don’t Take Shortcuts

Shortcuts are attractive because they may get you started in the direction you’re heading faster, but shortcuts don’t always provide the results long term you’re looking for.

If you’re serious about being a successful landlord,  become an educated landlord, learn to manage your properties as if it is a business and it will all become easier and simpler to either carry on as is, or to expand later. If you’re doing it right it gets easier.

And if you’re dropping a ton of money into Real Estate already what’s another little bit to make sure you’re doing it right.

Money spent on having the proper leases, money spent on getting the software to make your job as a landlord/property manager easier and time spent making sure you have systems in place all come back to reward you as you move along your rental property ownership path.

Lining up accountants and lawyers familiar with Real Estate make your life simpler and more controlled long term. These are all parts of your long  cut to long term financial wealth so try not to stray.

Is there any other additions I should have on this list that bit you in the butt as a landlord? I’d love to hear your feedback, leave me a comment below!

 

 

 

 

 

 

What You Need To Know Before You Own Your First Rental Property!

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Advice For New Landlords

Pieces of the puzzle with your first rental propertyI’ve been helping landlords for years now and as I look through the masses of info = I have shared, one gap I find is what a new investors needs to know before they own their first rental property.

The trigger for this was just a quick comment a subscriber named Matt left me the other day.

You see Matt’s been reading my articles and watching some of my videos preparing for his first rental property which he closes on at the end of the month.

He’s being pro-active, he’s getting prepared and educated and he’s being very smart about getting started!

I love it.

To hopefully get him off to an even better start I replied back to his comment with some additional tips and suggestions, but  I realized that unless someone is reading that specific article they will miss that specific information!

So I realized maybe I need some information all in one place to help others just like Matt! So here’s what I have.

Getting Started With Rental Property

Some of the information I’m going to talk about here you’ll find in other articles on the site or videos here and on YouTube I’ve done and I’ll include some references to these at the bottom of the article.

In my experience I’ve found that I read one article and don’t quite get a concept, but when it’s explained slightly different or from a unique perspective suddenly it becomes crystal clear.

I’ll also include a subscription form at the bottom where you can get my guide “The Secrets of Successful Rental Properties” where I also talk about some of these tips that apply to your first rental property and to your fortieth rental property, or at least in different ways.

So rather than babbling too much more, let’s get started!

Leases – They Are Not All Created Equal!

leases for your first rental propertyIf you’re not familiar with my background, my online start was with a site that helped landlords evict tenants in the province I’m located in, Alberta Canada.

Sure I had my own sites for my Real Estate biz that I’d created in the past or paid someone to build, but AlbertaEviction.com was all my own.

This site came about because of my own personal experience with so many evictions over the years. Now I hope it’s not a shock that a guy who educates landlords has had to evict a ton of tenants.

It should be more of a reality check.

Because just about every landlord I know has had to evict a tenant at some point in their career. Time and circumstances change situations and a perfect couple one year may be divorcing or laid off the next causing you the landlord problems as their problems trickle down.

It’s not uncommon for me to get emails from landlords telling me how they’ve had great tenants since they bought their first rental property five or even ten years previously, but suddenly they’re stuck evicting someone.

It can be a bit of a numbers game and the longer you own a property and the more tenants you have the better (or should I say worse) chance you have of getting a bad tenant.

In my case, I’ve just dealt with so many more tenants than the typical landlord that I’m that much more experienced with the negative aspect of the business.

Which bring me full circle back to my point about leases. One of the biggest problem so many landlords I helped through my eviction site had, was they used the wrong or if not wrong, a poor lease. Leases are not all created equal and the rules in various states, provinces and countries also vary making it important that your lease applies where your rental property is located.

An example of this is in my local area is that I recommend to landlords to only use “Fixed Term Leases” rather than “Month to Month Leases”. The reason being (at least in Alberta Canada) a landlord doesn’t need to renew a fixed term lease (find out local rules that apply in your area!).

“Fixed Term leases refer to leases with a start and end date, they can be as short as a one month term or as long as several years, but they have a defined end date.”

In English, that means that if I have a tenant who is constantly late with rent, doesn’t maintain the yard or I’m just not getting along with, once the lease term ends, I’m not obligated to renew it, they have to leave.

If instead I used a month to month leases that just rolls over with no fixed ending date, I require a valid reason to evict the tenant, so unless he is doing something in serious breach of my lease, I’m stuck!

The lesson from this is, understand your local tenancy laws and make sure your lease fits what’s best for you! You may not have the same rule about fixed versus month to month, but you need to understand what does apply and make sure your lease includes what benefits you the landlord the most.

Next step is to ensure you have a very specific lease for your region.

If you’re buying a generic lease from an Office supply chain, a corner store or downloading it off of the internet, it better apply specifically to your region.

Now just about any generic lease will work everywhere, but the problem is they are generic and they don’t contain the specifics you need to enforce them for your benefit.

If you can make your properties non-smoking, your lease needs to contain that information. If you don’t allow pets, your specific lease should state that. If you don’t want tenants to sublet rooms or the basement or a garage, your lease requires a clause stating the restriction.

I could go on and on, and I already have I believe, but I need to because it’s that important. Generic leases get you started, much like generic house plans are the building blocks for your dream home.

You need to fine-tune that lease much like you choose colors and materials if you are building a home, so it suits your needs and protects your interests.

It may require buying a lease from a local landlord association, it may require getting a custom lease created by a Real Estate specializing lawyer in the area or it could be somewhere in between. Just make sure it’s not generic!

For a reality check it should also not be a single page! My standard lease I’ve modified and edited over the years as rules change, is four pages long and uses a small font in order to contain all my clauses and information.

It’s that long because I try to cover everything!! And your lease should too!

Now onto the next priority.

Tenants – They Too Are Not All Created Equal

Tenant problemsMore reality checks for you, not all tenants are equal or will look after your property the same way.

That nice looking couple who seem so pleasant may be professional tenants who bilk landlords out of months worth of rent and understand how to live rent free for months or even years at a time by being smarter than their new landlord.

There are so many districts throughout the world that have set up very tenant friendly legislation that makes it virtually impossible to evict tenants in a timely fashion.

They’re set up to allow tenants to appeal or delay hearings month after month and even then they are awarded extra time to vacate. Professional tenants understand these rules and once they are in, they can cause havoc.

All while not paying, or while damaging your property or worse building drug labs or grow ops which you get stuck fixing later.

The lesson from this?

Screen your tenants diligently and rigorously. Create systems and processes where you check and double check the information applicants provide you.

This includes calling and verifying all references, previous landlords and contacts. I even go so far as to check online profiles for their Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and more to see who these people really are.

If you put in the effort up front to do all this fact checking, research and verification, you’ll find you can save yourself a ton of headaches going forward.

As my friend Julie The Street Smart Diva and I often talk about with students who have gone through our coaching programs, it’s far easier to let the wrong person in than it is to get that same person out.

Your job as a successful and educated landlord is to make sure you never let that wrong person in and makes sure they end up somewhere else while you reserve your property for the fantastic tenants you deserve!

The Final Lesson For Your First Rental Property

Processes, systems and checklists for landlordsCreate Systems! I just referenced this when talking about screening tenants!!

As new landlords and investors you have a ton to learn as you get started with your first rental property. From the incredibly important skill set of screening tenants to property maintenance and much more.

Some you may do yourself, some you may hand off to others to do, but long term, many of these processes need to be repeated over time. Often over and over as you own a property for years or expand your portfolio.

The challenge being, if it’s been a years since you last screened a tenant, can you remember all the steps?

If you happen to own several properties already and you’re ready to do your annual or semi annual inspections, do you know what furnace filter sizes to bring to replace at a specific property?

Do you know how many smoke detectors are in the property that take batteries and which kind of battery so you have them with you?

Or if you are adding a second or third property to your portfolio, what did you forget to do or ask the first time that you need to know for the next time?

Did you talk to your insurance people in advance to get the proper rental insurance in place?
Did you have a list of home inspectors you know and trust at the ready?
Did you have a list of requirements for your Realtor of what your next property needs to have?

These are just a few examples of the hundreds of questions that need to be answered as you maintain and expand your portfolio.

And yes it is a lot of work, initially at least. But that extra work at the beginning as you take notes gives you references and the start of check lists and the systems you need to streamline your landlord business going forward.

Once you get the basics of these processes down and in some semblance of order you’ll find it a helpful resource that you can go back to for years and years and that will make your land lording experience simpler, less stressful and ultimately more profitable!

Now just to tie all this together and to help make this easier to remember, I want to share with you what I call,

The Educated Landlord’s Mantra

  1. Remember how hard it is to get them out (bad tenants)
  2. Do your due diligence (on new properties & new tenants)
  3. Trust your gut, but have processes (so you don’t forget steps or get caught in emotional decisions versus rational decisions)

If you can remember these three steps as you get started as a landlord, it will carry you forward many years!

Landlord Lessons
Wrapping Up

So, those were my thoughts and words of advice about your first rental property, what would you add to this? I’d love to get some feedback from you, maybe share your advice or some lessons you’ve learned as you started in your Real Estate investing journey!

Just leave me a comment below and share any stories you could add and any feedback you might have! I look forward to your thoughts and will reply back to everyone!

Also, if you didn’t grab my guide The 7 Secrets of Successful Rental Properties yet, simply fill out the form below and you’ll get it emailed to you!

And finally, if you belong to a Real Estate group, know other landlords who this could help or could simply share this with people on your Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter feed, I’d really appreciate it!

There are handy share buttons right at the bottom of the article and the more people we can share this with, the more successful and educated landlords we’ll have out there!






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You Will Fail As A Landlord

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It will happen at some point.

Turn failure around as a landlord so you succeed

It might be something small, it might be something big, but you will fail at some point as a landlord and sorry it’s not an option.

It’s what you do with that failure though that will separate you from the landlords that simply quit after there first bad situation.

As many of you are aware, I have one website that teaches landlords (and tenants) about the eviction process where I’m located (www.AlbertaEviction.com for those that are interested). I have thousands of visitors each month and many of them are landlords who have just gone through their first eviction.

And often they are so disappointed with having to evict a tenant for the first time they are telling me they will be selling their property and it simply baffles me.

What the hell were they thinking and what lesson are they learning? They failed to have the proper tenants in place either through a mistake on their part, or bad fortune and they are taking their ball and going home? Not only did they fail, but they failed to learn and that’s far more depressing.

We all fail.

It’s how we learned to crawl, it’s how we learned to walk, it’s how we learned to run and it’s how we learn to grow. If we quit every time we failed we’d all still be sitting around on the floor in diapers never taking a chance to learn to crawl, walk or run.

Yet here are people who have invested typically their hard earned money into property and becoming a landlord and turn tail once it gets hard. These people are destined to continue failing as they won’t learn from their failures and use it to improve.

The few landlords that I do get to talk to I try to break it down for them.

They’ve just gone through one of the worst problems a landlord faces, the eviction process. They’ve gone through it and they now understand the process which does three things.

First it educates them (yes I am a big proponent of landlord education surprise right?), second it makes them highly aware they don’t want to do this again and leads to better screening, more diligence about their property and a renewed interest in treating their property like a business and third it shows them what they need to do if it ever happens again which takes a ton of fear, uncertainty and doubt (also known as F.U.D) away from being a landlord.

Now that you’ve gone through this and are better educated and informed, is it really the best time to walk away? That is an even bigger failure than going through an eviction.

Learn From Your Failures

Failures are lessons we need to learn from and adapt so we don’t repeat them.

And the more painful the failure the more we should learn to avoid repeating them!

Whether it’s evicting a problem tenant, discovering your property is illegal and is getting shut down, discovering your lease is inadequate or a million other instances or problems that can pop up in the life of a landlord these are all lessons we need to learn from rather than accept as failures.

I’ve failed more than most, but that’s simply by sheer volume, the important part is I try to learn from each failure and not repeat it.

I’ve learned about partners the hard way, I’ve learned about mortgages the hard way, I’ve learned about bad tenants the hard way, I’ve learned what needs to be done when tenants die in your property, what happens when sewer pipes collapse at your property and so much more.

Some of the problems were out of my control, some could have been avoided I learned after the fact, but I learned from all of these examples and a multitude more. Many of these lessons I now try to share through these articles and posts so you too can avoid them.

So it’s your choice, you can fail and quit, or you can embrace failure as an opportunity to improve, to rebuild and to come out better than ever. Just make the right choice!

 

You Got Your Lease WHERE?

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Paperwork Is A Key Component Of Your Business

Leases, contracts and landlord paperwork

And this includes your lease! Your lease is the single most important document you can have with your tenant as it sets the groundwork for your relationship.

But have you even read it?

I’ve talked with hundreds and hundreds of landlords and read dozens and dozens of different leases and the things I’ve seen have made my head spin.

From landlords who don’t bother with leases and just do everything verbally to hand me down leases that aren’t even legal in the state or province they are being used it.

You Need A Legal Lease

That’s part of the reason I’ve decided to work with LawDepot.com to help make sure more of you have the proper forms in place. LawDepot approached me last year about advertising on my site and I held off at the time, but the time felt right now to add them as as option for visitors here.

From leases to eviction forms and everything in between and around, they have the forms you need to protect yourself properly and to make sure you are doing your business right.

Now, to be completely transparent I do receive a commission if you do purchase through them, so it helps me as well, but more importantly, it gets the right forms in your hands.

To find out more, go visit them at www.LawDepot.com (that is an affiliate link) and see if they can help.

Alternatively you can also do some research and find a local apartment owner association. Groups like this often offer lease packages that tend top have the most current and up to date clauses and wording in there packages.

I’d definitely recommend you stay away from the off the shelf type products you find in office supply stores. These packages often tend to be extremely generic and tend to miss-out on specifics that would affect you in your state or province.

I’m Just Your Typical Landlord Hypocrite

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This is probably where I need to say, do what the landlord says, not what he does!

I have to confess, I’m breaking my own rules. Now I guess in the big picture that’s not a huge issue, but when it comes to a tenant owing me a ton of money and me suddenly finding myself sucked into the Eviction Spiral, it gets a bit serious.

After all, I’m supposed to be the expert, yet I’m making the same mistake I tell you not too and I guess I better tell the entire tale. So let me take you down the garden path….

Landlord story, down the garden path with a tenant

 

This actually dates all the way back to December with one of my weekly rental tenants. He’s a very clean neat individual, but a) he doesn’t speak very much english and b) he owes me money.

As we zip back a few months to the beginning of December as typically happens to many of my rooming house tenants they vacate around mid month and head back to where their families are located. It’s typical as many of the construction projects close down early before Christmas and many of the workers get to enjoy a two or three week break and trades folks are who I cater too.

So this is something I tend to see every year, then in January they start coming back, rooms fill up and it’s business as usual. Now my nice clean non-english speaking fellow named Michel had no one to go home to. No family around, nothing, so he intended to stay at my property over the break. the only issue being, he had no income coming in to pay for the room. (This is where the hypocrite part comes into play!)

As I weigh my options I have a few things to consider a) he’s a good guy, b) he’s been good about paying in his past history and c) I have a bunch of vacancies anyway and if I kick him out or he leaves I still won’t be collecting rent for that room and I don’t know what the next guy will be like and how many weeks before there could be a next guy.

So I did the easy thing, I let him stay.

Fast Forward to January

calendarI just happen to live in an oil based economy region so as January rolls around many of the projects have moved to a hold status due to the uncertainty of oil prices and the viability of some of these projects going forward if oil stays low.

Instead of starting work at the beginning of January, it turns into mid January, then late January and finally the beginning of February before he finally lands a job. the good news is, he gets paid a lot per hour, so it own’t take too long to get caught up. (Now I don’t want you to read anything into this, but I’m talking about getting caught up in February and here it is March when I’m writing this…)

Anyway, according to my rules, I should have cut bait and recast already. instead I go with my gut and give him more time. This is the part where YOU need to do what I say and not what I’m currently doing with this guy.

Now Fast Forward to Late February

Now we’re in the last week of February and I get a text update from him (he uses French to English conversion to send me texts, sometimes it is very very confusing). This set of texts though is quite clear. He will have $2,000 for me on Saturday the 28th (yes, I let a weekly tenant rack up an outstanding balance of over $2,000, please find me a wall to bang my head on).

As you can imagine I’m pretty upbeat when I go to meet him Saturday, at least at first.

You see, he lost his bank card and couldn’t withdraw the money.

Is it time to panic yet?

Of course he can’t tell me this due to the lack of conversational English between us, but he has notes that someone obviously wrote out for him in English. So now I’m stuck in a tight spot. It’s the Eviction Spiral I referred to originally.

If I kick him out, I take a huge loss, so I have to take a stand.

His notes tell me he will go to the bank after work Monday get the cash and get a new card and will have the money for me Tuesday night. Experience tells me this is the perfect getaway for him.

If he has $2,000 that is enough for him to get into a new rental place, with the 1st being the next day, it’s an optimum time for him to skip out.

But I follow the hypocritical emotional road and lay down the line, Either I get paid Tuesday or he GETS OUT!!

Even in our lack of a mutual language I am quite sure I got my point across, now I play the waiting game.

My question for you, what would you have done?  Let me know your thoughts in the comments below and I’ll add an update Wednesday about what happened!

Update Friday

Just to make this worse, I’ve extended to tomorrow. The tenant paid $200 to buy a few more days, but tomorrow is the cutoff. I meant to update Wednesday, but it’s been one of those weeks that will likely be extending out for the entire month!

Poof, It’s Magic!

Yes, I’ve had another tenant disappear…

I was at the property Monday to get some work and cleaning done there (I rented a steam cleaner for the day, so I was bouncing from property to property to get the most bang for my rental dollar) and my tenant’s room was wide open, all his items were gone, the room was quite clean, his keys were on the dresser and he was gone.

Bottom line, I’m out a bunch of money, my faith in humanity is eaten away a bit more and in the end I can still sleep at night. I tried to help, deep down I knew it probably wasn’t going to work out for me, but as part of my nature I really do want to help people (hence this site!), just along the way I may have to take a little damage.

The hypocritical lesson to pass along is if things are really tight, you can’t take this chance. You need to clamp down immediately. I could probably rationalize some of the loss as I would have had a vacant room for multiple weeks anyway, but it’s still a loss. If you have more losses than wins, you eventually lose and in Real Estate, you lose big when you lose.

 

Confused About How To Properly Determine Rents?

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Determining Market Rents

Determing Rental Prices For Your PRopertyA challenge many landlords face is what they should be charging for rent. When you need to determine rents, it can be a fine line between charging too much, or charging too little.

If you charge too much you end up with more vacancies, higher turnover and ultimately less profits.

If you charge too little you may end up with tenants staying longer leading to fewer vacancies, but ultimately also getting less profits.

Part of operating a successful landlord business is finding that sweet spot where you’re not too high and you’re not too low.

Many landlords wish there was some sort of tool that could help them with this and fortunately there is!

It’s a website called Rentometer.com and I’ve been using it for years to determine rents for my properties, to see how I compare and even to see trends over time.

Of course you shouldn’t limit yourself to just one source, there are multiple other ways you can get this info as well, or to help provide you with multiple comparisons just in case one is off a tad.

Fortunately for you, the president of Rentometer Mike Lapsley, provided me an article he wrote walking you through some steps to help you confidently set your rents. Here’s the article with some additional info about Mike and Rentometer for you! Be sure to leave him (and/or me) a comment.

5 Ways to Help You Confidently Set Rents

BY MIKE LAPSLEY ON FEBRUARY 23, 2015

The rental housing business is very local and it takes time and effort to understand a local market and all the nuances that go with it. Many variables can impact the rent you can charge for your rental unit including: location, building structure, amenities, age of unit, market conditions, etc. The subjective and local nature of many of these variables make it difficult for anyone to tell you exactly the right rent for your rental unit.

However, having said all that, there are some things you can do to help you more confidently set your rents. Below are a few ideas to help you set rents for your rental property:

1. Stay up to date on local economic and business activity in your market because economic activity is one of the key drivers of housing demand including rental housing.

2. Work with local real estate professionals – property managers, brokers, agents, appraisers, and lenders. Local experts are especially good at identifying the drivers of housing supply and demand unique to your market – jobs, local ordinances, zoning, etc.

3. Check local apartment listings using the local newspaper, apartment guides, Craigs List, and of course Rentometer (shameless plug!).

4. Check your local apartment or rental housing association for research and other information they may provide about local rent levels – past, present, and future.

5. Use “rent per square foot” whenever possible as a benchmark. This allows you to encapsulate into a single number all the subjective variables of rent and provides you a basis for comparison across different units, locations, amenities, etc.

The task of setting rents can be done more confidently with good current and historical data, as well as a thorough understanding of the local market and current market conditions.

Mike Lapsley is the President of Rentometer.com. You can reach Mike at: mike@rentometer.com Learn more about Mike here.

About Rentometer

Used by tens of thousands every month, the Rentometer provides rent comparison data and analysis through a simple, intuitive user interface. Everyone from landlords, property managers, owners, and renters can research and compare rental rates on Rentometer.com. Rentometer offers a basic free version as well as Rentometer Pro for users that need more detailed info, a professionally printed report, as well as additional tools to analyze the data. For more information, please visit www.rentometer.com, find them on Facebook at www.facebook.com/rentometer or on Twitter @Rentometer.

Hey Baby, It’s Cold Outside

By

Can you evict tenants in the winter?Winter Evictions

If’ you’ve never heard the song “Hey Baby, It’s Cold Outside”, you’re missing out, it’s a classic. If you don’t know what the rules are about evicting a tenant in the winter where you live, you could be missing out on some cold hard cash, like several months worth of rent.

The rules are different everywhere and with the temperature hovering around -30 degrees Celcius (-22 Fahrenheit) with the wind chill as I start writing, I thought winter evictions might be a timely topic.

Can You Evict Tenants In The Winter?

I think the most common answer is yes, but it can depend. I know, not very definitive as far as an answer goes. Ask tenants and they will almost all answer no, but if you’re getting landlord advise from your tenants you may have a much bigger problem…

The problem is the rules vary from state to state and province to province and it would be unrealistic to know the specific answer for every city, town, state, province, district or country throughout the world. But that’s where the internet comes into play.

I did some quick research and actually couldn’t find any places that allowed tenants to stay, just because it was winter. I started by specifically looking at provinces and states that were known to be more tenant friendly and cold.  I looked at rules in New York state, Minnesota, Ontario, Quebec and Alaska to name a few and all seemed to be pretty specific.

Evictions can take place at any time of the year if tenants are in breach of the lease. Now to be fair, I didn’t check every state, province, city and town, so you’ll want to do some local research of your own just to be well educated about it!

Winter eviction of tenants

However, just because it isn’t illegal to evict them, there is not guarantee it can be done quickly. There is a ton of leniency built into the laws when it comes to issues like compassion, hard times and basically bad luck. Here it isn’t written anywhere how much time someone has to be out of the property when evicted.

This gives judges and hearing officers the ability to make decisions based on the evidence and this could mean a quick and effective eviction in more grievous situations. While in other cases they can be given 90 days or longer, but with specific conditions in place or it can accelerate the eviction timeline. These would typically be payment conditions, but depending on the scenario they can vary.

Have you evicted a tenant in the winter? If you have leave us a comment and let us know where you’re at! Maybe we can form a mini database of info right here!

To get it started, I’ve not just evicted tenants in the winter, I’ve also done it right before Christmas and no I’m not the grinch, I just play one on TV! Looking forward to your comments.