Realtor rental commision -- every year???

[John Hatch]

Over the past year my wife and I have been able to rehab 3 houses and rent them. In two cases we weren't able to attract the right tenants ourselves and went with a local real estate company. They charged one month's rent to find a tenant. We're handling the month-to-month management ourselves. As the first year is coming to a close I see in our agreement that apparently we'll owe the realtor another 1 month's rent if they tenants stay. And also every year after that too. Is this common practice?
If it is I guess I'll have to be more diligent in getting our own tenants.

[Joshua D.]

I've seen this before, but as Jon said, that is bogus. It sounds like you got screwed by signing a very bad contract. What are your outs? I'd think it was time to go your separate ways, but of course you'll want to do so within the constraints of the agreement.

I hope there aren't any other clauses like that.

That said, here is another example why you MUST thoroughly read every contract that you sign -- Before doing so. Failure to do so and this kind of crap tends to happen.

Good luck and keep us posted.