Do your property managers provide vender invoices?

Question

I have worked with different property management companies. Some provide 3rd party invoices and receipts, some don't. Do you ask your property manager to also provide the invoice that they receive from the vender? Mine currently do not. They show charges on my monthly statement. It's difficult to be sure that I am paying the correct amount on any individual contractor invoices. What is customary?

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I have worked with different property management companies. They are charging 7% and 10% of vender invoices. Do you ask the property manager to also provide the invoice that they receive from the vender? Mine currently do not. They show charges on my monthly statement. It's difficult to be sure that I am paying the correct amount on any individual contractor invoices.

Patti Robertson · Answer

@Gaemer Gutierrez I own a PM firm and we do attach our vendor receipts to our owners portal. We do not charge a % of the bill, but instead charge a flat fee to oversee a work order. Whether we are coordinating a hot water heater replacement or a roof replacement, it’s the same amount of time to coordinate. I’ve never felt charging a % of the bill upholds the PMs fiduciary duty to the owner when the PM gets paid more the higher the bill is. Where is the incentive to save the owner money in that scenario? 🤷‍♀️

Scott M. · Answer

In all honesty even if they say they are not charging you a % (or a flat fee) and they show you the invoice no way to confirm they are not making a % or fee from it.  Contractors can overbill by X% and X% stays with the management company.  This comes down to trust.  We chose to be upfront and honest about our fees VS hide it but not everyone does that.

Out of all of our clients we have zero that ask for receipts on most items.  We have a few from overseas that have a tax requirement of showing material costs on larger items (furnace, hot water tank, windows, roof etc) so we send them material receipts.

That said, we have all the receipts, just no one wants them so we do not proactively send them.

Susannah Vila · Answer

Similar to the PM that @Joe S. is using, we decided to have each owner set their preferences for how we should coordinate their maintenance for them upfront:

1. Choosing which service providers should be prioritized (i.e., "I trust these people for HVAC, always go to them first"

2. Specify how much we can spend before reaching out for your explicit approval. You can do this by individual work order, set a max budget for the whole year (we let you know if you're tracking towards going over, or both (both is recommended)

You'll also see the work orders and receipts but that's mainly because people need them for their taxes.

Joe S. · Answer

Currently I work with two different property managers. Someone from their team calls me and goes over a bid before it is approved. Once it is approved they move forward. Where as I approve it before the work is done I don’t see any need of asking for a receipt. Don’t know if they would give me one if I ask or not, but it’s a non-issue Since they cleared the expense before proceeding.

Davartay Miller · Answer

@Gaemer Gutierrez I can only speak from experience and how our company operates. Our Customer Service team works closely with owners and clients like yourself – every step of the way. Usually if there is a charge on an owner’s account . . . .they know about it because they receive monthly calls from our customer service team. However, we do not send the invoice breakdowns as well. But guess what? We do not mind sending our owners any additional information that we receive . . . If that’s what makes them comfortable. Ultimately, when you hire a property manager their job is to protect your investment and truthfully forward you the bill + their markup (if applied). Thankfully, we do not have issues with our clients wanting invoices because we try our best to be very transparent on the front end. The most important thing is our core four: owners, residents, vendors, and team. What does that mean? We want to make sure we are communicating on all levels (communicating with all four core members) and that starts with trust.

Best of Luck!

Do your property managers provide vender invoices?

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