Quantifying time, energy, money vs value

[Teresa Conner]

Hello All,

My husband and I have two rental properties and currently live outside the U.S. Our current property managers have failed us at every opportunity, and our real estate lawyer failed us when we called on him to help us deal with the property managers. At this point we are trying to take a long, hard look at the overall process to decide what is worth our attention and what is not so we can make better decisions moving forward. We are looking to quantify time/energy/value and money for legal research, routine maintenance and management, routine repair management, emergency maintenance and repairs, tenant placement, tenant turnover- getting the place rent ready, tenant turnover- security deposits & changing locks & copying keys, etc.

My ultimate goal is to figure out where I'm wasting my time and energy that could be put to better use. After a terrible experience with my property managers and a lawyer who didn't read my management agreement and gave me incorrect counsel, I'm wondering if it would be worth it to try and manage my properties from another country. Or if it's worth finding a property manager who is minimally involved (the things I can't do while physically in another country) while I manage the bulk of it myself? What items are worth contracting out and what items are reasonable to do as owners who live abroad?

Has anyone else quantified these things in this way? What was your outcome? Is there a better way to gauge what I should spend my time, energy and money on? Below is an example of our method to quantify each item.

• 
  Tenant placement (includes marketing and background check)
• Time: 7 hrs
• Energy: Medium
• Value: Highest 
• Money: flat fee = $750
  

• Legal Research
• Time: 5hrs
• Energy: High
• Value: High
• Money: 250/hr = $1,250