Some rental property owners may consider self-managing their property rather than hiring an experienced Austin property management company to handle it for them. While that’s appealing from a pure numbers perspective, it’s often not a smart move if you want to succeed in Single Family Residential (SFR) real estate investing.
There are many potential downfalls of self-managing a rental property. So, if you’re considering doing it yourself, there are some important aspects you should keep in mind.
Below, we outline some of the top things you may not know when self-managing your rental property.
Attracting Tenants
The success or failure of real estate investing obviously revolves around attracting tenants. After all, if you don’t have tenants for your rental property, you won’t be making money; you’ll be losing it.
But the real key to long-term success in the industry is attracting the right tenant for your property. You shouldn’t just rent out your property to anyone who comes along and applies, as that could lead to disaster in more ways than one.
You need to vet all applicants, which includes conducting extensive background and credit checks. Just because someone has a decent credit score and nothing major pops up on their background check doesn’t mean they’re A-OK, though.
If you want to self-manage your rental property, you need to know what signs to look out for on these reports, as well as with the other information prospective tenants provide on their application. Making the wrong decision on tenants could result in big losses and huge headaches.
Making Repairs
If you want to self-manage your rental property, you’ll have two choices when it comes to making repairs: You can either hire someone to do them for you, or you can handle them all yourself.
If you don’t have the know-how and the skills to do the repairs yourself — which many rental property owners don’t have — then you’ll be forced to find someone you trust to do it for you.
This adds more work for you, as you’ll have to vet people and companies before you hire them.
In addition to all the time you’ll spend doing this, it will also cost you a significant amount of money.
One of the advantages of working with an experienced Austin property management company is that they have trustworthy and experienced repair companies already under contract, ready to help. This not only reduces your workload but also helps control costs.
When repairs are needed, you want to make sure that they’re done right the first time. Repairs can quickly turn costly if you or your handyman don’t know what you’re doing.
Time Dedication
The age-old saying is “Time equals money,” and it holds very true in SFR real estate investing. Every minute that you spend managing your rental property on your own is a minute that you don’t have for something else.
When you self-manage your rental property, you’ll have to approach real estate investing from a hands-on perspective. In many ways, it will turn into a full-time job for you — or at least close to it.
You’ll need to find tenants and interact with them, collect rent, do ongoing maintenance and timely repairs, and much, much more when you self-manage your property. Doing all this will leave you little time to pursue other income-generating activities, such as holding down a “regular job,” or even just resting and enjoying life.
When you hire an experienced Austin property management company, you can approach SFR real estate investing from a more hands-off, passive perspective. You’ll entrust the company you hire with all of those things, allowing you the time and energy to focus your efforts on other aspects of your life.
Legal Concerns
One aspect of SFR real estate investing that isn’t talked about enough is the legal liabilities that go along with it. There are very strict and stringent landlord-tenant laws and regulations in place in every state and just about every locality around the country.
If you aren’t up-to-date and in compliance with them, you could face significant legal liability. For instance, you could face an expensive lawsuit from your tenant if your lease isn’t written correctly, or if you don’t return their deposit in a certain time frame after they move out.
If you self-manage your rental property, the responsibility of educating yourself on these landlord-tenant laws, and remaining in compliance with them, will be on you and you alone. When you hire an experienced Austin property management company, you’ll be partnering with an entity that has years of experience in local SFR real estate investing and can ensure you’re always in compliance with all relevant laws.
What Happens When You Self-Lease or Your Realtor Does It for You?
If you have a Realtor handle the lease of your rental property, but you’re going to self-manage it, there are many move-in concerns that you have to pay attention to. Some questions you need to answer are:
- How will you handle the movie-in documentation?
- How will you ensure that the property is up to code before the residents move in?
- How do you handle disputes, changes and problems on moving day?
- And what happens if the tenant doesn’t have the full rent but wants to move in or move in early?
These are all items that a Realtor will very likely not help you with. It will all be on your shoulders, and you may not have the time, expertise and/or know-how to handle them.
When you hire an experienced Austin property management company, though, all of these concerns are taken care of for you. None of them will fall on your lap.
Hire 1836 Property Management to Handle Your Rental Property
While self-managing your rental property may seem attractive from a financial perspective, the fact is that you’ll often spend much more money doing so than you would be hiring an experienced Austin property management team to partner with you.
When you work with a company like 1836 Property Management, you’ll not only be saving money in the long run, but you’ll also be saving valuable time and avoiding the huge headaches that can result from managing your property on your own.
To find out more about how we can help you succeed in real estate investing, contact us today.
