You might be searching the web to find questions to ask a property manager.
We get it, you should ask a lot of questions! In this article, we will walk through the most common questions we receive. At evernest we have the pleasure of working with two types of owners:
- Homeowners who want to rent their personal house
- Investors who either have or are building a portfolio of rental houses
Birmingham is a unique market in that there are many opportunities for investors buying low, middle and high-income houses. This coupled with a solid local economy are reasons investors from around the globe have targeted Birmingham as a solid investment opportunity. No matter if you're a homeowner looking to rent your house or an investor, there are common questions we hear over and over. You might call them Frequently Asked Questions. At gkhouses we have someone who is responsible for all of our new owner calls or web inquiries...her name is Maya Madden. We asked Maya to talk about the five most common questions owners ask when we speak with them on the phone. So, here we go!
1. How much do you think I can charge for rent?
With mortgages, insurance premiums, and taxes in mind, the biggest worry for a homeowner who has never rented a house before is how much they will get for rent. Some owners believe all they need to do is add up expenses plus tack a little extra for profit and...presto...there's your asking rent. As Lee Corso says on Football Saturdays - Not So Fast, My Friend! It's extremely important to find your true market rate in order to minimize any losses while marketing your home for a resident.
So how do we find that market rent?
As previously stated in a more detailed blog post on market rent, there are three great ways to help find a market rent value for your home.
- First, we'd suggest taking a look at either Zillow.com or Trulia.com. Both sites can provide an excellent starting point and will also be referenced by residents when looking for a home to rent. However, from our experience, some of the rental rates these sites give you can be a little bit inflated.
- Secondly, search for local property manager sites for comparable homes in the area.
- Lastly, check your neighborhood for other homes for rent and inquire about their rental rate.
Each of these options should provide you with a good idea of fair market value and a price point that will help you find a good resident quickly. What we've come to find out is that if you market your home and you're not receiving a fair amount of calls or applications, there is either a price or a product issue. Your house could be overpriced and no calls or applications is the market's way of telling you that you're not in the ballpark with your price. Or if you're getting some interested parties come to look at your house but not a lot of applications, it's possibly a problem with your house (the product).
2. What happens if the resident tears up my house?
Even when a homeowner is moving out and deciding to rent their home, they may have raised kids in their home or had other great memories from their time living there. The last thing they want is for a resident to cause damage to their home. So, what happens if they do? Of course, the first line of defense is the security deposit. When a resident signs a lease with gkhouses, we collect a security deposit up front equal to one month's rent and hold it in an escrow account until the resident's lease is up or terminated. Upon resident move-out, a property manager will visit the home and perform a move-out inspection. During this inspection, he is looking for any damages caused throughout the residents stay. We determine what is resident related damage and what is considered general wear and tear. Our maintenance team works up an estimate on the repairs. We charge any resident related damage to the security deposit. Occasionally, the damages to the home are more costly than the initial security deposit. In this case, gkhouses charges the resident for any additional damage upon move out. If the resident does not pay, we pass it off to collections. Here's a copy of a recent move-out inspection so you can see what one of our owner's receives when a resident moves out.
3. Can I have a say in who rents my home?
The short answer is no. It's left up to the owner to decide whether or not to allow pets in the home, but Fair Housing Laws do not allow owners or property managers to take any of the following actions based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex, familial status or handicap:
- Refuse to rent or sell housing
- Refuse to negotiate for housing
- Make housing unavailable
- Deny a dwelling
- Set different terms, conditions or privileges for sale or rental of a dwelling
- Provide different housing services or facilities
- Falsely deny that housing is available for inspection, sale, or rental
- For profit, persuade owners to sell or rent (blockbusting) or
- Deny anyone access to or membership in a facility or service (such as a multiple listing service) related to the sale or rental of housing.
Rent to a family only?
One of the most common requests from a homeowner is that we only rent their home to a family. Of course, this is something we cannot do, not only can we not discriminate against people based on their familial status, but we cannot ask whether they are married or have children! Fair housing laws are a serious issue and we have a zero tolerance policy here at gkhouses. If you should accidentally break one of these laws, you could land yourself in a messy lawsuit. For your safety, either strictly adhere to these regulations or let a professional property manager handle finding a resident and the resident screening process for your home.
4. How do you make sure you collect rent?
Collecting rent can sometimes be one of the tough parts of managing properties. With that being said, gkhouses has around a 98% collection rate on residents we place in homes. Our successful collections rate is very dependent on our thorough resident screening process and our disciplined collections process. When we first started in business with our own rental properties, collecting rent was not a fun task...especially if the resident was behind. And that's typically the only time when a resident heard from us...when they owed us money. And the only time we usually heard from a resident was when they had a maintenance problem.
Tension
This created a tension where neither one of us really wanted to talk to the other….and in this business, that's not good! In order to defuse this tension, we started sending residents monthly invoices like we all get for bills that are coming due. This helped tremendously. We also began maintaining an open dialogue with each resident about the rent they owed when it became past due. This includes emails and phone calls. We understand that life happens sometimes and a resident may either be late or miss a month of rent. However, we expect them to communicate these issues with us and discuss a payment plan with us. If residents ever stop communicating with us or cooperating, our collections process heats up. We give residents multiple opportunities to work out a payment plan with us. If they refuse, we move them to the next "bucket" and eventually post eviction.
5. How does maintenance work?
This is one of the most popular questions to ask a property manager. And maintenance is always one of the homeowner's biggest worries. While living in the home, it's easy for the homeowner to notice what needs to be fixed. They will fix it or they ignore it because it doesn't bother them. It's different when dealing with a resident. When they notice something, they will place a maintenance call into the office. And that's ok...we want residents to have a safe, secure, and well cared for home. We rely on these residents along with our quarterly inspections to let us know when the house needs repairs. The process works like this:
- The resident notices something is wrong in the house.
- The resident will either call us or fill out an online form to inform us of the problem.
- One of our technicians will go out and assess the situation.
- If it's a repair that can be made for less than $500, they will take care of it on the spot.
- If it's a repair that will exceed $500, our Operations department will deliver an estimate to the homeowner.
- The homeowner can either choose to have gkhouses make the necessary repairs or they can find a contractor on their own.
Don't Leave Them Hanging
The important thing to remember is the resident has an issue. The sooner it's taken care of, the better this ongoing relationship will be! Our maintenance team is made up of skilled professionals. We employ plumbers, electricians, HVAC technicians, and general handymen. Owners enjoy the peace of mind knowing our licensed and insured technicians are working on their home. Here at gkhouses, we require that our owners carry a maintenance reserve. It is $500 or $100 per property if you have more than five houses. This fund is used for any small maintenance repairs that come up while the resident is in the home. Ultimately, our goal is to provide quality and attentive service to our owners and residents. We respond in a quick and helpful manner. If our residents and owners are happy, we're happy. If you're a homeowner and have questions outside of these five, feel free to reach out to Maya. She can be reached at mmadden@gkhouses.com and she'll be happy to answer them for you! Call if us you think of any more questions to ask a property manager. And don't forget that you can always check list of FAQ's.
