All Forum Posts by: Jessica Stinnette

Get a realtor, vacancy is lost rent never recouped. The fee you'll pay the realtor for the listing commission will likely be less than what you'll be paying for more than 1 month of vacancy. Not to mention a realtor has a larger pool of exposures to get your listing visibility.

Be careful how you word any of this though, if you had told the tenants the adult son could apply but not his wife and daughter it could be familial status violation for fair housing. I would just tread lightly. Reality is, the wife and child will likely move in if he does. You should answer with, anyone over the age of 18 must apply and be approved to be formally added to the lease and permitted to move in.

We don't use OnSightPros here in VA but I can tell you we do use another company that is local here very similar to OnSightPros and it has been the best company decision we've made yet. We used to have in-house inspectors but it was hard to scale and with our heavies season being that of summer months, at 1000+ units we weren't able to hire enough inspectors for the last day of month move outs and first day of month move ins and then still keep them fully-employed in our slower season in fall/winter. So being able to outsource to a company who is solely focused on inspections, turnaround times of 24 hours from inspection to report in hand with photos, it's our first summer using them and it's been amazing.

You could also reach out to a local, reputable, property management firm to see if they offer a la carte services for lease preparation, application processing, move in inspection, etc, if you are planning to self-manage but need some help with the more formal items.

You should also consider posting reviews of your experience with facts, not opinions, to the public for their awareness. This should include google & yelp as many seeking property management go online to read reviews, too.

I created an addendum in this situation and each unit was billed based on pro-rate of the square footage. 

Utilities:

Tenant agrees to ratio utility billing where utilities remain in Landlords name and monthly bill pro-rated and billed to Tenant.

Tenant in lower level unit #A will be billed based off of 900 total square footage, of each bill.

Tenant in upper level unit #B will be billed based off of 2,537 total square footage, of each bill.

Utility charges will need to be paid in full by the following first of the month. Funds will be automatically applied to unpaid utilities prior to rent.

In the event unit #A is vacant, utility charges will be the responsibility of Tenant in unit #B with a 5% reduction of bill*, until unit #A is occupied and then billing resumes on a pro-rated portion, as described above.

*5% of utility bill to be paid by Landlord while unit #B is vacant. Once unit #A is occupied, and then billing resumes on a pro-rated portion, as described above.

We use RocketStation for VA's and they train them on Appfolio if they haven't used it before, but many VA's have.

NEIGHBORS are a huge help, too! We had a squatter break into a home we had just rented but lease hadn't started yet, they let themselves in through the doggy door. The neighbors reported the lights on and how we found out and cops were called. 

We require anyone over the age of 18 to apply to live in the property if they will live there more than 14 consecutive days, that is written in our lease. Would never allow anyone to move into a home without applying and be formally added as occupants to the lease, hopefully the lease also holds all occupants/tenants equally and severally liable for the lease. 

I just created an addendum to the lease that all parties had to sign. Outlined the total amount owed and the months allowed to pay it back in, then divided it by that # of months and tacked it onto their rent. So if $2,000 owed and rent was $2,500 and the owners wanted it paid by in 4 months, starting 9.1 they'd pay $3,000 for months of Sept, Oct, Nov and Dec