To All The Landlords Freaking Out

[Kyle Mccaw]

To all the landlords.

DFW is not immune to the current economic turmoil. So yes, things are not all fine and dandy right now. So, I figured I should give a short, maybe premature, rental state of the market here. To understand where I am coming from, we focus on class B & C single family homes in North Texas. We also have two mobile home parks and very few apartments units.

Let’s step back, take a deep breath and calm down to make ration decisions. True there are many negatives in the marketplace. I don’t feel the need to state the obvious ones. So let’s just point out some positives.

• As of 3.25.2020 less than 1% of our tenants have reached out to our firm about potential interruption in rental payments.
• Our number of inquiries from potential tenants has decreased only 20%
• This may because people realize that living in a small apartment is less desirable during a shelter-in-place situation.
• Many of the professions our tenants have are in the fields that have the strongest demands now. i.e. Amazon delivery, truck drivers, Uber Drivers, Certified Nurse Assistants, School Teachers, City Workers.
• It looks like the government is cutting checks to our tenants. Many of them don’t even have an income disruption. So this is just a bonus.
• Many of our tenants already did or can work from home. Gotta love technology.
• On the bright side as of March 25th none of my tenants April rent is delinquent. 😊 And yes many have paid early.

Going forward you may want to consider a few slight changes to your business model.

• Having tenant default insurance is starting to look very attractive. Most of our clients declined it. But for less than a $1 a day, it sure looks like a good deal now.
• You need to make it easier financially for tenants to rent from you. We reduced the cash out of pocket tenants need to move in. We use an insurance product to replace the security deposit. This allows tenant to move in with the purchase of a very cheap insurance policy. Ironically, it covers us better than a traditional deposit.
• Use professional photos and video tours. This makes it easier for tenants to decide on your property without visiting it.
• Electronic lockboxes allow self-showings. You need to be very diligent with this as there is still fraud out there.

I hope everyone finds some value in this. Don't let fear control your actions. I pray my optimistic gut feeling is correct. Time will tell.

We are in this together.