New landlord of an 8-plex

[Nick Bleser]

Hello BP!

We are under contract to purchase an 8-plex in June and I'm hoping some of the experienced landlords could help with a few questions.

The first thing I plan to do is talk to a lawyer about creating a lease agreement. Does anyone have any suggestions on things that aren't so obvious to add to the lease?

Other than an application, lease, condition checklist and possibly a lead disclosure, what else do I need for paperwork to place a new tenant?

I'm hoping to create a process for finding and placing new tenants that can be used over and over. Can anyone share their process?

Thank you in advance!

[Michael Jones]

When i bought my first apartment and was handed the existing leases I knew I had some work to do when they were only one page long. 

Rather than pay a hefty lawyer fee i drove around on a Saturday to several of the larger and newer complexes and inquired about renting an apartment. The managers were more than happy to show me a unit, tell me what their screening criteria was and hand me a copy of their lease for me to look over. 

Once i had several leases in my hands i just sat down and started with the lengthiest one and went through the others and highlighted any item that the other leases didn't have in the first one. 

I then typed up a lease that covered everything possible in all of the leases and ended up with an eight page lease. It was a lot of work but the education I received has been more valuable than the money I saved.

And now when a tenant calls with a question about something there are so many times I can refer them back to the section of their lease that covers this issue.