Finding a good tenant could be a long and daunting process. You want a tenant that not only takes care of your home but also pays rent on time. To find an excellent tenant we highly recommend you hire a Houston Property Manager that will do the necessary checks to ensure a good tenant.
A person can be well mannered and have a steady job but for many unassuming landlords they might become your worst nightmare. An experienced property manager knows what to look for. Take it from us, we’ve been property managers for a long time and we’ve seen it all. Here is a testimonial from one of our owners:
Have you thoroughly thought through what it takes to lease your property? I didn’t until this happened: A few years ago, we bought our first investment property and decided to lease it out. The idea in general was good. We wanted to maximize our profit so we didn’t hire a property manager.
We never anticipated the consequences of leasing our home to someone else without having an actual property management company help us. We simply asked ourselves the question: How hard can it be? And of course, we were saving money by not paying someone else to do it for us. This decision was a no brainer!
Well, let me tell you! We paid some big consequences for not hiring a property management company in Houston. We both have full time jobs and the tenants would constantly call to get random things repaired. Some of those items were justified; others were simply not needed. We spent at least 2 days a week responding to their requests and about 1-3 days a month “fixing” issues at the house. Oh yes, and the rent was usually about 5-10 days late. This was not so good since we were paying a mortgage for this home.
In addition, we noticed something we never thought about…how about cleanliness? We simply thought everyone likes a clean house, right? Not right! Our tenants did not care about our home. Six months into our lease, we started realizing that every time we went in to repair something the house was not very clean and by that I do not mean just not cleaned-up. It was not tidy as in the carpet had more stains, dust everywhere, and the house had a strange odor. We realized several of their complaints were the lack of preventative maintenance to the home.
We asked for a home inspection to ensure everything was okay with our home. The tenants simply refused to let us in! After about 2 months of back and forth, they finally responded and only to tell us they were moving out with only a two week notice!!
When they moved out our home was destroyed (see images below). It had the worst odor as they had a dog and a cat. The cat urine odor damage was so bad, we had to replace carpet, baseboards and sheetrock to make the smell go away.
Today, I can tell you that hiring a property manager may cost you money but it’s well worth it. Even keeping the tenants’ deposit wasn’t enough to repair the damages that was done. Furthermore, the money we received for the rent did not pay for the time we wasted trying to fix their carelessness.
If you are ready to deal with stress, late night phone calls and weekend trips to your property; then go ahead and lease your home without using a property management company. Truly, I wish you luck!
