Nathan M

I have numerous friends and family in the area that I regularly have property management conversations with. The most popular recurring topics are usually around how long X property has been vacant, or how bad X person’s last tenant was. The bad stories are always far more fun to tell, or at least more entertaining to listen to, it seems. It got me thinking though, I rarely have bad tenant stories to talk about, and I never have vacancies longer than a couple weeks. As such, my fellow landlord’s stories are always far more interesting than mine. My friends and family always ask how I get so lucky. Somehow I’m not entirely sure luck has much, if anything, to do with it. After speaking with fellow landlords, and some of our rental software users I’ve come to the conclusion that the following listings and policies can account for most renter and vacancy issues.

It starts with the listing. Do your listings set expectations appropriately?

For instance, if your listing states that you do tenant screening, this immediately weeds out most prospects who know they won’t pass a background check. Conversely, if there is no mention of screening required everyone who cannot get approved elsewhere is going to apply for your property, only to use your time and energy to ultimately be rejected when you do the background check.

Do you charge an application fee? Almost every state allows it and it is common practice as it pays for your screening expenses. If you do, mention the application fee on the listing. This will weed out all the applicants that can’t afford a small application fee.

Eliminating unqualified tenants at this step saves you the maximum amount of time and money. Instead of showing the property to unqualified applicants, you can focus on fewer more qualified applicants.

On to the application. Do you let your applicants cheat?

Whether you do online applications or paper applications, the application should be thorough and ask lots of pertinent questions. The most basic of questions should include full contact information, SSN (if allowed), birth date, employer, at least 2 most recent landlords, previous rental details, emergency contacts, employment information, and common questions about criminal felonies and bankruptcies. All this information should also be collected for any additional adults that will be in the home. A prospective tenant not willing to fill out an application entirely is not a serious renter and grounds for disqualifying the applicant. Also, if any answers do not match what you pull on the background reports, that is an instant red flag.

Don’t be a pushover.

Do you get phone fishers calling asking about your properties, only to ask before they’ve even seen the property if you will take a lesser amount? The correct answer to that question any time before an application is returned and the property has been displayed, is always “NO”. Considering a rent concessions before you’ve met the people and before they’ve seen the property tells the tenant you don’t have much confidence in the property. This leads to “can I pay rent late again this month”, and “I was really hoping it would be OK if my 12 cousins from out of town could stay just a couple more months..”.

If however, after you’ve met the tenants, if they have already passed your qualifications and need a concession to close the deal, that is the time to make a concession.

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Nathan is a member of Rentec Direct who provides property management software, tenant ach payment processing, and tenant screening for property managers and landlords nationwide.

California has passed a bill (SB 150) now disallows HOA's from changing the rules mid-game on a landlord by restricting rentals within the HOA. This bill took effect January 1st.

An association which previously has no restrictions on rentals, that attempts to amend the HOA to then restrict the amount or percentage of rentals is now prohibited from doing so. Such a change in bylaws will have no impact on existing owners unless the existing owners specifically provide their authorization. The existing owner by default will get grandfathered into the pre-restriction rules.

It however does not protect the next owner of a home in the same association. If a home is sold, the new HOA rules related to rentals will apply to the new owner and the previous owner must disclose the fact of the restrictions.

I have mixed feeling about this. My first impression (as a Landlord) makes me think this is great! If I bought a property in an association as an investment property, and later the association changed the rules which prevented me from renting my investment property that could be catestrophic to my cash flow. On the other hand, I prefer smaller government and less government interference in my affairs. An association is a mini-government in itself, and I generally trend towards wanting decisions to be at the smallest and most local form of government possible. In this particular topic, I think property rights might trump my preference for local government though.

Thoughts?

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Nathan is a member of Rentec Direct who provides property management software, tenant ach payment processing, and tenant screening for property managers and landlords nationwide.

I wrote about Google Voice a while back and provided a detailed review of google voice right after it was released to the public. Time really does fly, as I'm shocked to see that was 3 years ago back in 2009. Since that time, Google Voice has become a valuable part of mine and many of our client's process.

Here's a complication of great reasons landlords and property managers are using google voice:

1. It's free! This goes without saying, you can't get much good stuff for free these days; however, google voice continues to be an exception. You get a free phone number, free online storage, free voicemail, free texts (sms), and free transcription.
2. Documentation. More than ever, tenants are communicating with landlords via text message. Most phones do not permanently store text messages, and even those that do stand to risk being lost and that documentation goes away forever. If you use google voice for your tenant communications, those text messages are stored forever. Read more on how documentation is a property managers best friend.
3. Privacy. Many landlords do not want their tenants having their home phone or cell phone numbers. With google voice, you can provide this number and re-direct it to any phone of your choosing, to ring at your choosing. Don't want to receive calls from 9pm - 6am, no problem.
4. Multiple destinations. With google voice you can configure roll-over so if you (or your employee) is not available at one number it tries another, which could even be another person. This is a fully automatic, and free, way to gain the capabilities of an expensive phone system.
5. Did I mention documentation? Having a permanent record of voicemails and text messages is critical in todays litigious environment. Save everything, and google voice makes it really easy for voicemail and text messages.

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Nathan is a member of Rentec Direct who provides property management software, tenant ach payment processing, and tenant screening for property managers and landlords nationwide.

I was pleased to read about Wisconsin proposing new rules which are actually in favor of landlords. It's an increasing problem across the country where cities and counties are passing laws which could harm the very fabric that landlords rely upon to run their business.

Some examples of laws some localities have passed or plan to pass:

1. Prohibits or limits the landlord from obtaining or using various types of information about a tenant or prospective tenant, such as household income, occupation, court records, rental history, and credit information;
2. Limits how far back in time a prospective tenant’s credit information, conviction record, or previous housing may be considered by the landlord; or
3. Prohibits the landlord from showing a rental property to a prospective tenant, or from entering into a rental agreement for a rental property with a prospective tenant, while the current tenant is living there.

These laws proposed in Wisconsin prevents cities, towns, villages and counties within the state from passing their own local ordinances which restrict landlords in the above manners.

Obviously the local governments are attempting to protect tenants; however, it's entirely at the cost of landlords being able to run a business. Somewhat akin to taking away the ability of a car buyer to be allowed to read reviews on the car before purchasing it. Requiring them to purchase the car sight unseen, thereby just guessing if it's going to work well for them.

Taking away the very necessary screening tools that landlords need to rely on is a very very bad idea IMHO. I hope these pro-landlord laws are a trend that continues and is adopted by more states. I'm not thrilled about my city changing the rules mid-stream on me or my clients which prevent them from being able to run their business effectively.

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Nathan is a member of Rentec Direct who provides rental software, tenant ach payment processing, and tenant screening for property managers and landlords nationwide.

Was just reading this this morning. Really makes me wonder if it's a Christmas "gift" to tenants during the Christmas season, or a political maneuver of some sort. Has anyone experienced them doing this in the past? Is Fannie going to join in too?

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Freddie Mac announced it has ordered all evictions involving foreclosed occupied single family and 2-4 unit properties that had Freddie Mac mortgages to be suspended from December 19, 2011 to January 2, 2012.

“If the property is occupied, our foreclosure attorneys will suspend the eviction to provide families a greater measure of certainty during the holidays,” said Tracy Mooney, Senior Vice President of Servicing and REO at Freddie Mac.

The suspension will apply only to eviction lockouts related to Freddie Mac-owned REO properties and will not affect other pre- or post-foreclosure processes.

Freddie Mac was established by Congress in 1970 to provide liquidity, stability and affordability to the nation’s residential mortgage markets. Freddie Mac supports communities across the nation by providing mortgage capital to lenders. Over the years, Freddie Mac has made home possible for one in six homebuyers and more than five million renters.

SOURCE Freddie Mac

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Nathan is a member of Rentec Direct who provides rental software, tenant ach payment processing, and tenant screening for property managers and landlords nationwide.