Baltimore Section 8 Tenant Placement Professionals

[Sam Frank]

Hi Baltimore Folks,

I have a property that looks great. It is a 4 unit building I might be able to live in and renovate with an FHA 203K loan. I would like to find Section 8 tenants for the other 3 units. I have never managed a Section 8 rental home before, but understand from people that oftentimes if you go onto gosection8.com or craigslist and price rents accordingly for your neighborhood (I used comparable rents from gosection8.com), that you should be able to find tenants with ease.

I have had listings posted for about a week, since I started diligencing this asset, just to get certainty on how easy it will be to rent this place out, if I were to assume a $2,000 mortgage on the property. I have not gotten many bites.

What do you guys do? @Ned Carey @Account Closed any advice? 

Is it worth the expense to pay someone who professionally screens and places tenants? Will the increased rent amount they get you and the decreased vacancy make up for the fee they are likely to charge you? 

Any insights on slow uptake from tenants? I know it is November - so slow time of year. Would love to buy this property but without assurance of rental income at a certain rate and low vacancy, this investment starts to look dangerous.

Sam

[Ned Carey]

@Sam Frank My partner handles new tenants but generally our  main source is Go section 8.. We also sometime work with tenant placement services. Expect them to charge 1 months rent. 

Some of it has to do with the marketing - do you have good pictures and an enticing description? Is your unit updated and really good looking? Is it in a desirable location?  If the answer is yes then maybe it is your price. Sometimes I have offered incentives like low security deposit or free flat screen TV.