What are your biggest pain points?

Question

Hey all, I was chatting with some landlord friends and trading notes about what part of being a landlord stresses us out the most. One that kept coming up was remote management. Curious what other landlords stress out about the most.

Jim K. · Answer

My biggest pain point is when a tenant calls me for something utterly stupid. One of them saw what was most likely a black squirrel (we have them in this area) in the back yard and is convinced it was a rat. She has no idea what a rathole looks like, but she is terrified the squirrel is going to get into the house through a crack in the back concrete steps that lead up to the enclosed back patio. The crack in the steps leads to to the poured concrete slab under of the back patio. I went over there, I'm sitting there and looking at this crack, and I'm wondering if it's worth my time to try to explain how concrete is poured to form a slab and that the crack between the steps and the patio doesn't lead into the house or if she'll think I'm lying through my teeth to avoid doing anything. Eventually, I stuffed some steel wool into the crack and I'll go back there in a week or so with a bag of concrete and a tub to make a full-on tenant-satisfaction pantomime out of filling that crack and protecting her against the terrifying concrete-tunneling squirrels.

JD Martin · Answer

Finding and keeping low-end trades - handymen, cleaners, cleanup laborers, etc. I have good hvac, plumbing, electrical, etc, but it seems like everyone on the low end is doing it out of the trunk of their car and you get one job out of them, and it's not even the pay. I call these guys "Meth Money Mondays".

James Wise · Answer

My advice to you was to hire the company with the largest market share. If you are looking to hire an individual property manager I think you are setting yourself up for failure. To successfully run a profitable management company you need to have at least 300 or 400 doors and a full staff. A 1 man or 1 woman operation is nothing but a hobby business or a business ran by someone who isn't smart enough to scale or hasn't yet scaled.

Terry Lao · Answer

@Connie ChanI'm in southern California, and have both local and out of state (Las Vegas) rental properties. I have done both managed, and had property manager. If I had a choice, I rather just manage myself and save the 8-10% management fee. If I had to select a pet peeve of property management, is the utter lack of timely response from tenants in either text message, email, or phone calls. As to why, I think it is attributed to age, income level, and being tech savvy. The older a person is, then not used to texting or don't carry cell phone on person. The younger a person is, then not as much income, and cell phone bill might not be paid on timely basis. Terry

Connie Chan · Answer

@James Wise both! The people who are looking to hire don’t have a sense of who is good or not and revert to yelp and thumbtack. They also don’t know if the properties are being well maintained because they can’t visit it in person frequently. For those doing it themselves it’s often finding handyman or plumber or something similar. Oftentimes they “have a guy” but that person isn’t always reachable.

Caleb Heimsoth · Answer

@Jim K. I could hear the sarcasm and frustration through that comment. That’s wild. Try not to put your head through a wall in frustration

Dean Letfus · Answer

I always think, that unless you want to have a full time job as a property manager, the biggest pain about being a landlord is being a landlord. I'd rather find good property managers and never have to worry about land lording. Then I can focus on what I'm good at, finding deals. Managing tenants in many markets is just hard work for little reward. I consider avoiding fees by doing it yourself to be a false economy unless you have nothing better to do.If I can't make more money finding deals than I could by paying myself management fees then I am in the wrong game.

Luke G. · Answer

Mine is easily contractor's going over-budget.

Connie Chan · Answer

@James Wise great idea. I never thought of that. But wouldn’t that lead you to hire companies versus individual managers? A company could probably tend to things faster but also seems harder to hold accountable. There’s something nice about knowing the specific individual property manager.

James Wise · Answer

Go on Zillow, Trulia, Hotpads, Facebook and/or Craigslist etc. and look at all of the for rent ads. Whichever company has the most is probably the biggest.