Use A Property Manager or Do It Yourself DIY?
Wednesday, October 8th, 2008
Our friends at PMDave.com have posted an informative interview with Marc Cunningham of Grace Property Management and Investment.
They examine the question of whether you should hire a property management company or self manage. Now of course Marc is going to try and soft sell you on using a property management company. Nevertheless, the video has useful information for you as an owner such as the concept of being nice, but firm with your tenant.
This being nice but firm approach really reinforces our recommendation that you NEVER rent your home out to a family member or friend. That is probably the biggest rookie mistake that owners make.
The video also brings up a very important point, if you move-in a good tenant there is no reason to have a property management company. In otherwords you need to do a background check on all your prospects. You can pass the cost of the background check off to your prospect by telling them that there is a $30, non-refundable background check fee that they must pay with the rental application. You can do the background check from the comfort of your own home right over the Internet. There are varying degrees of background checks but $30 is about how much you should pay for each one. You should get the background check that includes court cases. You not only want to check the prospects credit worthiness, but you want to see if they are a professional con artist that has a pattern of taking owners to court. No court cases and good credit with a stable job = good tenant.
Duration : 0:1:49