VA Beach Property Management

[Jonathan White]

Hello All,

I am new to REI and am trying to get my feet wet. I currently have a real estate agent I am working with (just the same agent I bought my primary residence with), and he seems to do everything I really think an agent is useful for, i.e. showing me properties, quick responses, MLS auto-updates, etc.

Recently, I called a local PM company in the VA Beach area (found him at random, just chose the one with the highest ratings from Google search) to check up on average rent amounts in a particular neighborhood. He quickly told me to stay away from that neighborhood, but proceeded to list multiple schools I should try to stay near, and certain locations and types of properties that do well in this area.

When I let him know that I currently do have an agent that I'm working with he just wished me the best of luck and then told me to hit him up if I had any issues with my current agent. What really got me was that he texted me after we hung up and told me that if I buy properties through him, he will manage them (including full services of property management) for 7%, as long as the property was acquired through them.

My question is... Is that normal? 7% seems like a pretty significant drop from the usual 10%, but I also have very little experience. Keep in mind, I have no current rental properties (VERY new to this game), but it sounds like a pretty amazing offer. Should I just keep that in the back of my mind, or is it worth bailing on my current agent to work with this PM company?