All Forum Posts by: Heidi Kenefick

I have a house that I rent out by the room. Right now only one room is rented long term, and one rented on a 3 month lease to a travel nurses. I have interest from people to rent out the other rooms long term.

Someone just applied that wants to rent for 6months to a year. Obviously it is better to have longer term tenants for stability. He did indicate that he smokes but won’t smoke in the house or at the property. This is a furnished rental- so I’m worried he might smell up the furniture or bed.

Would you all rent to a smoker? How likely is this fact going to cause problems with the other roommates?

I’m new to self management and new to by the room rentals. Thanks for the advice.

@Delbert Standifer

I’m renting by the room. I have it advertised on furnished finder and through avail. It’s tricky to find tenants honestly.

Yes I signed up for baselane and it seems to be working ok. It does have a lot of features and navigating around the website is a bit cumbersome because things are not where I expect them to be. Even getting to the accounts is a lot of clicks and one day I couldn’t find the accounts at all. So that’s a bit annoying. But it does categorize everything which is helpful. 
I’m not sure if it has a pay bill feature, or checks. I need to explore that.

I also started using avail, which I like. However when it publishes to websites for marketing it isn’t obvious that I’m renting rooms not an entire house so I get a lot of dead leads. And one of my tenants can’t figure it out the pay rent feature. 😂
 

It’s actually working really well and has been very helpful. Wish I had the skills to build a spread sheet but computers aren’t my strength. I’m much better with pen and paper 😂

@Rodrigo Campos

Let me know how it works! I wouldn’t be opposed to switching banks since mine merged and I’m not a fan of the new bank.

@Courtney Duong

Someone on BO actually shared their spread sheet with me and it has been super helpful. I’m not an excel guru and could never have built a spreadsheet. The problem I was having with Stessa and Rentastic is that it only tracks what’s in the bank account not what I get from the PM, so the numbers are off and I have to go in and correct it all. Was a lot of double accounting which was cumbersome.

@Alison Evans

I could not imagine managing 48 doors! That seems like a bit of a nightmare. I’m struggling with 3, in part because they are being rehabbed out of state and just keeping all the expenses organized is a lot of work.

Let me know how you like baselane. I think I’m going to try it.

What software do you use for leases? I’ve toyed around with avail and rentredi and apartments.com but haven’t settled on one yet.

@Alison Evans

Hi Alison,

I’m just get started and on my have 3 properties and am trying to figure out the best way to stay organized! How many do you have? Spreadsheet sounds like my own personal hell. I’m terrible with excel. 😂

@Andrew Janssens

I’d love to chat with you about baseline. Have you used them? They are very new which does make me a bit nervous.