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Top 10 Tips For New Landlords

Landlord Advice

Being a landlord is not an easy job. While the rewards are good, you’ll have to go through issues such as having tenants that are not paying their rent on time or those who don’t make an effort in keeping their living environment clean due to poor hygiene related habits. Fortunately, here are some tips you can do so ensure success in your house or room rental business.

1. Know how the industry works. Before getting your feet wet in the business, you should first know how things inside it work. You can read books about house rental businesses, attend basic seminars or ask existing landlords who have enough experience in the business. If you want to get innovative ideas, you can brainstorm with professionals who are knowledgeable in the field of house rentals.

2. Establish house rules and stick to them to make things easier. You can create rules as you go along the way. It is important that you put them in writing so you’ll have constant reminder for your tenants. This also saves you the time and energy in explaining specific rules regarding a specific issue or incident as well as addresses all the possible questions your tenants may have.

3. If you want to attract quality tenants then you should have a quality property. This sets a specific standard for your tenants. You can clean the place and have regular repairs on the property. This isn’t limited to the property itself. This also covers the way you conduct your business and your relationship with your tenants.

4. Setting a specific time range for transactions and conversation with tenants can make your job easier. Having a tenant calling you late at night can disturb you in your sleep so it is best to set a specific time when your tenants can talk to you for requests, inquiries or payments.

5. Consider outsourcing a professional for construction and repair work. You might be tempted to do house repairs by yourself but this will only take a lot of your time you should be using to keep track of your business. Besides, it might be impossible for you to make complicated house repairs so your business option is to outsource a professional for the job.

6. Make sure you are organized. As a landlord, you are required to keep track of things such as past transactions, receipts and other papers for your rental business. Have your own filing cabinet where you can put duplicate of receipts you have given your clients, payments and papers issued by the government for your business. Have a notebook for writing down repairs needed to be done on the house such as roof leaks and electrical repairs.

7. Charging extra fees for late payments can help you. If you cannot tolerate late payments, you should consider giving penalties in the form of additional payments. This may sound cruel but late payments can make your business suffer. This will push your tenants to pay on time. Tenants usually make more than the rent they pay so they should be able to pay on time.

8. You should stay away from having family or friends as your tenants. This will cause you a lot of problems. You can have them asking you for favors such as allowing them to make late payments or giving them free rent for a month or two. This usually makes getting payments on time hard and will cause your business to suffer. If you really need to play landlord to family or friends, make sure you get a rental agreement – this is one of the biggest mistakes landlords do when renting to family and friends is skip the contract, and it always causes problems later on.

9. Stay away from being the owner of your property. As a landlord, you are expected to get into awkward situations and conversations with your tenants. Dealing with issues may force you to do some confrontations. To avoid this, position yourself as a property manager. When imposing rules or policies on your tenants, tell them that it is not your own decision and that you are just telling them what the owner wants. This takes off the social pressure you might get from your tenants.

10. Protect and respect your tenant’s privacy. Your tenants have their own personal lives that need privacy. It is important to let them know that you respect their privacy. This in turn will earn you more respect from your tenants. If you need to check the house or room they are renting, give them at least a 24 hour notice. Prior to entering the property, be sure to create a notice to enter form using our notice to enter template.