Property Management Information and Expectations

Everything we do is done with your best interest in mind

We have a fiduciary responsibility to our clients.  That means we are required to put your best interests ahead of everyone else, including our own.  All of our policies, procedures, and systems are done with your best interests in mind.  We understand that some clients may have specific preferences on how things are done.  We’ve learned over time the best way to serve our clients is to ensure the results are consistent and predictable, and the best way to ensure that is to make sure our practices are totally uniform across the portfolio.

We’re here to generate results

We have the experience, knowledge, and systems in place to efficiently and effectively manage your rental property.  Our objective is to make you as much money as possible with as little effort as possible on your part.  This is accomplished by utilizing our existing policies, systems, and relationships that we’ve built with vendors.  We’ve spent over a decade perfecting the process of managing rental properties to guarantee the best possible result.  Our results speak for themselves.  If you want to maximize your profit and minimize your effort give us a call.

We operate on trust

We want you to be totally comfortable with us managing your property.  We are incredibly good at what we do, but we don’t want to take total control of your property if that’s not what you want.  With that in mind, it is not possible for us to be flexible on how we manage your property compared to the hundreds of other properties we manage.  We get great results because we have uniform operations.  We have a large staff that has to be trained and provided instructions, and the more uniform our operations are from property to property the better our results are in the long run.  While we would love to be able to allow you to make specific decisions about how your property is managed, we’ve learned over time that’s simply not in the best interest of us, you or the tenant.

We will be most effective if you let us do our job

We’re intended to be a single point of contact for your tenants.  So long as we’re aware of problems/situations, etc we can input into our systems and ensure they’re resolved quickly, efficiently, and cost effectively.  We cannot be effective if you don’t let us do our job!  For us to be most effective we ask that you direct all inquires directly to us, whether it be about available properties, repairs/maintenance, or anything else.  Once the lines of communication are divided it makes it very easy for things to “fall through the cracks”, which lowers tenant satisfaction, and can potentially damage your home and return on investment.  If you have specific instructions or concerns (how much a vendor might cost for repairs, etc) please let us know so that we can address them, and so that we can implement a plan to reduce your concerns as much as possible.

We will pay your bills and do much of your legwork

You will occasionally get an email with a scanned in invoice, we’re not asking you to pay this invoice by emailing it to you, we’re just trying to ensure you are well informed and can ask any questions you would like to ask before we pay that invoice.  If we need you to pay something directly we will make that abundantly clear, this is not something that happens often at all, and usually you will be aware of the need to pay the invoice before the work is even done, so it will most likely be something you’re expecting.  Additionally, we may contact you to ask if you have a preferred vendor for a particular specialty (ex: Garage door repair), we’re not asking you to contact anyone or make any arrangements, we are simply clarifying who we should contact to resolve the problem with your property.  We will do the work for you!   Once again, if you make your own arrangements it actually makes it much more difficult for us to be effective, so it not only makes more work for you, but it also makes more work for us.

Avoiding existing tenant dissatisfaction

Most people don’t like changes because of the unknowns that come with them.  We’ve found that the vast majority of our “inherited” tenants really like renting from us once they get used to the changes.  We have multiple ways for tenants to contact us, report problems, and/or pay their rent.  We’ve found that the best way to ensure that existing tenants remain well satisfied in their home (and more likely to stay) is for you to direct them to contact us anytime they contact you.  Please don’t answer questions, agree to any requests, or otherwise provide them with a satisfying response when they contact you, if they get the results they’re looking for when they contact you they’re more likely to continue that behavior.  The best way to get them “out of your hair” and allow us to earn our commission is to instruct them to contact us directly and we will resolve their issue.  Once they’re redirected once or twice they will likely quit contacting you.  If that doesn’t work we recommend you quit answering the phone or responding to their attempts to contact you.

Communication is Key, and we try to always communicate in writing

We mostly communicate with our clients via text.  If we don’t get a response we will contact you via email.  We know everyone has their preferred method of communication and as much as we want to maximize your satisfaction we’ve learned that it’s better for our staff to have a uniform method of contacting an owner that applies to everyone.  As with all of our policies, this is intended to ensure that your property performs, and any issues that arise are dealt with immediately.  With the responsibilities for your property distributed among a large staff this is the best way to make sure things get done right and on time.

Payment of proceeds

We directly deposit payments into your bank account.  Our management software no longer allows you to enter your banking information directly, so please send your routing and account number to your onboarding contact.

Reporting Information

We send a monthly report at the end of every month which should reflect the income, expenses, and reserve amounts held related to each property we manage for you.  If you ever have questions or concerns before the end of the month we can send a month to date report anytime you’d like upon request.

Reserve amounts

We generally maintain a reserve of $500 per property we manage for you.  This allows us to make repairs between tenants, and generally ensure a smooth operation of your property.  This is still your money, and it’s held in our trust account, so upon termination of the management of your property we will be refunding that amount to you.  Unless you instruct us otherwise we will deduct $50 per month from your proceeds until we have reached the $500 reserve.

Maximizing Property Performance

We’ve been managing rental properties for a long time.  And we have a very good idea of what can be done to improve the likelihood of success for your property.  If we make a suggestion it’s not because we want to criticize your property, it’s because we want to see you succeed in real estate.  We have a policy of giving the best honest advice we can without being rude, but sometimes it can be hard to hear.  We will work with you to ensure your success if you will work with us and understand everything we do is for your benefit.  If you need financial assistance in paying for needed repairs, please don’t be shy about letting us know, we’ve “bridged the gap” for several of our clients, and we’ll be happy to help you in any way we can as well.

Weekly Vacancy Reports

While any of your properties are vacant we collect lots of data about it’s activity and performance.  We will send you a report with this information every week.  In some cases once we feel we’ve collected enough data we may make a recommendation to make a change, often times lowering the price.  We will always follow your instructions, so long as they comply with all relevant laws and our ethical code, so if you don’t want to make any changes we will proceed as you would prefer.  Our recommendations are based on our experience and are only to help you to succeed and profit.