Hi, it’s Nick with Sell My San Antonio House. And this is our list of five things you got to avoid, if you’re going to be a landlord. And the last one, I do believe, is the most important.
IGNORING MAINTENANCE
First, ignoring maintenance. I know you got a maintenance call. It’s not exciting. But when you ignore maintenance, what do you end up with? Two things most of the time. Your property gets torn up and your tenants are mad. Neither of these are good. Now that does not mean that you have to jump at every request that very second. Certain things are more important than other things. Safety issues are obviously most important. But even when you get things like, well, they said it’s leaking under the sink a little, but they’re okay with it. They might be okay with it, and that’s very nice of them, ut then you just got a cabinet, that later, when you go to turn it over, and now you have to replace this cabinet, or you at least have to do some damage repair. Other things like that, that you just don’t fix. They do annoy your tenants and they deserve a place that’s up and running.
ALWAYS THE GOOD GUY
Just trying to be the good guy all the time. It’s a business. Treat it like that. Hey, they didn’t feel like paying the rent on time. They didn’t want to pay late fees either, so it’s not a big deal. Okay, it’s probably not going to get you where you want to go. Does that mean you have to be mean? No, you don’t have to be mean to anybody, but there are rules, and there’s a lease. And you can follow the rules, and they can follow the rules, and you can have that relationship. And both people can be very happy.
People understand that they have to pay on a certain timeline. Are there exceptions? Of course. But are there exceptions for time after time, after time? You need to make that decision and make sure you’re running your business, and not just trying to be the guy that they like and the nicest guy.
DEPOSITS AND FIRST MONTH’S
Collect deposits and rents. Before you let people move in, and it will come up, or it will happen to you. You have to get that deposit, and that first month’s rent. And those funds need to be certified, and they already need to be there before you let them move in. It’s not, “Hey, I’ll pay part of it now. And then can I pay part of it later? And then part of it later?” Or, “Hey, well, I got it, but I’m in a real big hurry, so let me just move in and then I’m going to get it to you.”
These things are going to come up. They are not a good idea. They put you at way too much risk and there’s not enough upside. You want to get your place leased, great. But you can’t rush your process to rush to meet somebody else’s timeline.
TURNOVER TIME
Turnover time. Yes, you want to get your place leased. But in between tenants, you have to jump on this, because it’s not just, “Okay. Well, it’s not costing me that much. Maybe I got to paid off. So I’m not like paying a mortgage.” You are paying, because let’s say this property rents for a $1,000 a month. If you mess around for four or five weeks, so now you’ve got a whole month that it was vacant. So you’ve got a whole month that it was vacant, so that’s your $1,000, plus you were probably paying taxes on the time, plus you’re paying insurance. You’re not gaining from that. You know when somebody’s moving out, great, schedule it. Okay, let’s get our folks in here. Let’s see what we need to do to turn this property over.
Now, it’s time to get the property marketed. Let’s get it up and going. We want to make that as fast as possible, because, over time, cutting down that turnover time can make a huge difference in your bottom line.
POOR TENANT SCREENING
And this one, don’t do it. Don’t do it. Poor tenant screening. There are tons of third party companies that you can find to help you screen your tenants, and you need to have a process. There are people that just barely screen a tenant, partially screen a tenant, some people that don’t do it at all. You are asking for a problem. Your tenants need to be screened. You would need to have a process where you call references. They need to have references from their previous landlords. If they don’t, well, then what’s the reason for this? Is there someone else that does pass all the screening process? That does have all the references? That has everything, lines up? That’s the person that you’re looking to go with. Skipping your tenant screening process, or listening to reasons why it’s okay that they had all these evictions and these other things you are asking for a problem.
So make sure you don’t avoid these, or make sure you do avoid these. Scratch that, okay. Avoid all of these, and you’re going to be a much happier landlord and your tenants are going to be happy. And if you made some of these mistakes, it’s okay. We’ve all made some of these mistakes. Don’t kick yourself, dust yourself off, and moving forward, get yourself a plan. How am I going to handle maintenance? Well, what’s going to be in our lease and how are we going to stick to our lease? Do I make sure I get my deposits, my rents, ahead of time? My turnover process, what is that? Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. What’s my tenant screening process? Do I stick to it every single time?
You follow these, you’re going to be a lot happier, and you’ll probably be a much more successful landlord. Or if you’re just tired of being a landlord and you would be happier, just sell the house and move on. I hope it helps. If you like it, please hit the subscribe button, and we’ll talk to you soon. (210) 201-6644