Having rental properties make a great source of passive income. But, managing the assets and the business can become stressful and challenging with growing investments. And if you are someone who lives abroad and doesn’t have access to your properties, the issues can prove to be fatal to your business.
To save you from that, property management services help you manage your tenant-related issues by supervising the operations.
The 11 benefits of getting a property management service are discussed below.
1. Tenant Screening
Risky tenants are bad for business. They can erect a plethora of issues like:
- Late payment
- Property damage
- Shorter renting span
- Scams
- Discrimination lawsuits
Although it’s possible to move problematic tenants out before the contract ends, the process is lengthy and can be a ground of expensive legal proceedings.
Property management services screen your potential tenants beforehand and will match you with pre-vetted tenants that fit your preferences as closely as possible.
A discrimination lawsuit can be devastating and expensive for a property owner. An experienced property management company helps to ensure that you don’t ever need to face such situations by using verification methods that are universal among potential tenants.
2. Acts as a Buffer
In an ideal world, you would never need to face any complaints from the tenants. But, that seldom happens. It’s only wise to be prepared for tenant complaints and bad reviews.
But, as a property owner, you don’t need to make a personal connection with the tenants as a property management service acts as a buffer between both parties. Most of the service providers are experienced enough to handle agitated tenants that can shake down your mental health.
If an issue needs to be personally addressed, it’s best that it comes from a source that you are comfortable with and not from a stranger who can potentially gaslight you.
3. Rent Management
When you have hundreds of tenants on your properties, it gets complicated to manage the rents.
The monthly due dates, payment status, and contracts, can get messy real quick.
A property management service utilizes its already established process flow and software platforms to manage it all for you. Arguably, you might be able to manage the issues with a software, but that would be more costly than hiring a service.
They use their proprietary software to create separate accounts for all of their clients and hire employees to help you in business aspects. A perfect arrangement for your passive income.
4. Lower Maintenance Cost
Tenants are happier when maintenance is taken seriously. Managing your properties and scheduling maintenance can be challenging. And if you consider doing it yourself, mismanagements are inevitable and can cost you manifolds more than hiring a property management service.
Generally property management services—having multiple clients like yourself—sign agreements with different maintenance companies to get the best deals, which you’ll find hard to match. In this aspect, it’s in your best interest to hire a property management company to administer your maintenance schedules.
5. Tenant Management
With long-term tenants, you can save a lot of time and money on maintenance and legal issues. A good tenant retention policy is absolutely necessary to sustain tenants that are willing to stay longer in your estate.
A good property management company ensures that your tenants are content with the services you are opting for to retain the good ones. They are also expected to guide you with their experience to schedule the maintenance that makes the tenants happier.
6. Marketing Your Rentals
Having a to-let sign is often not enough. Most of the interested tenants would never know who to call or when. With a property management service, which is online 24/7, you can be assured that your potential leads aren’t getting away.
They also have more experience in the local real estate market and can promote the vacancy in more effective ways.
The most effective marketing strategies of these services involve targeting the audience, promoting on social media, using their reputation, and connecting to the community as a local business.
By knowing the pulse of their potential tenants, they offer them a neighborhood that appeals to them.
7. Legal Issues
Legal issues are inevitable in a rental business. Even one bad tenant can shake your whole business down with the effective strategy in place. If you are living abroad and have no intention to get into legal complexities, property managers are the best alternatives.
They work as mediators between you and your tenants, and try to keep personal and legal challenges away from you. They know the local laws and can handle the issues better than non-residential homeowners.
8. Vacancy Management
Once a contract ends and everything goes well, you’d be left with a vacant property that needs maintenance. You’ll also need to find new tenants and market your asset all over again.
An experienced property manager is expected to have rental applications and maintenance teams ready to go even before the contract ends. Making the cycle efficient and less time-consuming.
Indeed, a suitable arrangement.
9. Accounts Management
While billing and accounting are critical to sustain your business, if this is your passive income, spending time and resources on that doesn’t seem practical. You potentially can also forget to file the taxes and be left with hefty late fines.
Property management companies ensure that the invoices and accounts are maintained thoroughly to save you from federal notices and fines. They also keep track of the due rents and eviction dates to ensure that your business runs optimally.
10. Eviction Handling
Often, the tenants refuse to leave properties after their contracts have ended. Even if you screen your tenants thoroughly, it can happen to you too.
As a property owner, it’s in your interest to make them leave as soon as possible. But that often seems impossible when living abroad. An experienced property management company notifies them about the approaching dates, helps them find a new home, and moves them quickly to ensure prompt arrival of new tenants.
11. Less Stress
Hiring an expert also means that you mostly wouldn’t be disturbed by emergencies and stressful events, like eviction and legal issues. You’d also have more freedom to travel, leaving your properties in their safe hands.
The Bottom Line
The benefits of hiring property management services are limitless. Their services like tenant review, marketing, rent collection, and legal issue handling will help you concentrate more on growing your assets and accommodating more tenants.
If you travel a lot, leave the accounting, billing, and eviction procedures to your property manager and have a stress free business tour or family vacation.