A large part of maximising a sale price when selling your investment property is diligence and care though the property’s life.
Bad tenants or an inexperienced property manager can prematurely wear and tear your property, reducing its value by tens of thousands of dollars.
The short answer is YES!
Changing your property manager mid lease usually doesn’t incur any charges. It’s as simple as signing a new managing authority with your new agency, at this point, your new property manager will do the rest.
Your new property manager will:
A great sign of a good property manager has regular communication, at least every three months. If your property manager is making an effort to report issues, manage repairs, organise routine inspections or give you feedback on it all, they’re on the right track. Remember, no news isn’t always good news.
A successful leasing campaign should produced a high quality tenant in a space of 2-3 weeks, otherwise it’s costing you money. Beyond this time frame, you should be hearing from your property manager with suggestions of how to improve your campaign.
It takes time for a new property manager to learn there portfolio of properties and build rapport with you and your tenant. Rapport is vital for dispute resolution and winning the best outcome for the landlord. It may also imply that there is high turnover in the company: indicating deeper problems.
Another sign of a poor property manager are surprise repair bills that seem higher than normal.
A good property manager should provide feedback of an issue before organising a repair ie. photos and a detailed description. Then give the landlord an opportunity to take on the repair works or let the property manager organise it all.
Tradesmen are very sharp when quoting work and can spot an opportunity to over quote a job when dealing with a decision maker that doesn’t have an interest in a low price.
If you find yourself in a scenario where you’re looking at a big repair bill. Pick up the phone and ask a few trades people what they would charge for the job.
This does happen from time to time, hence it is wise for a landlord to have some leniency on the odd occasion. Late rent on a regular basis can be a bad sign on many levels and a sign it’s time to change your property manager. What to look out for:
Putting up rent for no reason could be a quick way to lose a good tenant. This is common with large real estate agencies that are too automated by reminder software.
A wise property manager will conduct a rental appraisal based on comparable properties, then giving their professional opinion if a rental increase is wise.
Good tenant selection can cover over the sins of an under preforming property manager. If the right due diligence is not done, a bad tenant can give a landlord grief on many levels.If this is happening too often, it’s best to change your agent and ask your new PM to manage the tenants out of the property.