Are you sick of your rental tenants calling you at all hours of the day and night with one problem after another? Are you tired of having to clean the apartments past tenants leave empty? Have you had your fill of repainting walls that have been painted dark green? Do you dread having to track down delinquent tenants each and every month?
Property Maintenance and Problem Tenants
If you are having a difficult time keeping up with regular maintenance of your rental property or the requests of the tenants in your building, you may want to consider meeting with a property management firm and hiring someone to do the job for you. Property managers are responsible for screening prospective tenants, all maintenance calls, any small repairs and getting vacant units ready for new tenants.
If you are not able to hire a property management firm and you have more trouble with your tenants than you do with managing your building, then it is time to schedule a meeting with problem tenants. Have a copy of the lease on hand for the meeting. Explain in great detail what requests are within reason and what is not required of you as a landlord. Let you tenants know what assistance you will be able to offer and what they can expect from you.
Delinquent Rent
When it comes to delinquent rent, all regions have an eviction process that you have to follow. Typically, an official government form is delivered to the tenant, which will advise them of the number of days they have before they must either pay the rent that is owed in full, or vacate the unit. No matter how angry and frustrated you may become with you tenants during this time, be sure to follow the eviction rules and regulations of your area to the letter.
Property Options Australia
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Tags: eviction, landlord, lease, rental investing, rental property
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
It’s easy to screen your own tenants including credit, criminal and evictions. And don’t forget to call references about their rental history – which is most important.
Good advice Cathy, phoning referees would be one of the best ways to get a good picture of how tenants have performed in the past.
Hi Sean,
I really think using the services of a property manager is the best way to go. I think it’s more important to spend your time finding the best investment properties to buy than it is dealing with the day to day problems of owning a rental property.
Besides, a professional property manager will be much more experienced at handling these issues and should be able to resolve them quickly and easily.
I had shudders reading the first paragraph…what a headache! Being a landlord myself I find just being fair with my tenants has worked in the past, only once have I had some slighly bad tenants and they only got behind due to jobloss…but by allowing them a fair bit of grace they caught up later.