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Updated over 7 years ago, 06/25/2017
Should I hire a property manager for my first property?
We are going to close on our first rental property this week! A year and a half of analysis paralysis is coming to and end! My question is would it be best to hire a property manager or manage ourselves. Here is our scenario.
With property management, vacancy, maintenance, cap ex accounted for, we will net roughly $350/mo. We won't rely on any of this money for living expenses, it's purely for reinvesting.
We live 35 miles away from the property. My wife and I have full time jobs and I also have a seasonal business during the winter/spring that keeps me very, very busy (70-80 hrs/week with full time job). We have two young kids and I am a football coach! My wife is going to go part time next year to be able to spend more time with the kids while they are young/work on building our RE business. I have been working on putting systems in place to help us streamline our business but this is all new so there will undoubtedly be bumps in the road. Would it be wise to hire property management to take care of our investment leaving us more time to focus on acquiring new assets or should we save the roughly $200/mo in PM fees and manage ourselves? My only hangup is that during my seasonal business I have to focus on that as much as possible and am worried about added stresses that may arise with the property. I know it's a to each their own question but just looking for some insight from those that have experience. Thanks in advance!