All Forum Posts by: Kelly N.

@James Sullivan

Yes, we absolutely show occupied units, it is standard in my market. Tenants expect it.  The reason is that the vast majority of apartments are leased months before they are available to move in to, so we are signing leases now for summer move in dates.  

In my opinion, it's actually safer for me.  The person booking the tour will not know if I the tenants will be home or not, and therefore do not know if I will be alone or if the tenant will be home at some point.  We have contact information for those touring, and if there ever was a theft issue (during or after a showing), that list would be turned over to the police.  It hasn't been an issue- knock on wood.  

It's a college town, and it's well known that you need to start looking for an apartment 6 months ahead of time.  If you don't, you end up with a crappy apartment in a less desurable area.  They actually passed an ordinance in the neighboring town stating not to sign a lease that starts more than 6 months in advance- when I was in school there we signed a lease my freshman year in September that started that August.  

We schedule leases to start at least 2 days after the end of the previous lease to allow time for repairs and cleaning if needed- some landlords here have tenants moving out and new ones in on the same day!  Those units aren't even cleaned between tenants, they rely on the outgoing tenants to leave it clean, and if they don't the new tenants don't feel the need to clean thoroughly when they move out.  We've inherited lots of those issues when we bought buildings, but have found that the tenants will leave things much cleaner if it's clean when they move in.

  If renovations are needed, those are scheduled in between tenants, timing has to be managed carefully.

I have continued to show apartments, but have been taking added precautions.  I am asking those viewing the units whether they have symptoms or possibly been exposed to COVID-19 prior to showing them the apartment.  We are using hand sanitizer and wiping down things I touch (light switches and door knobs) plus items the prospective tenants touch like handrails.

We show occupied units, and typically have leases signed 5 months before the unit will be ready for the new tenant.  I am also filming walkthrough tours to share with prospective tenants in lieu of an actual showing.  I've found it helpful to send them a video of the empty apartment as well as furnished with the current (or past) tenant's things- it makes it easier to get a sense of the space.  I had done this in the past for out of state renters, and just rented one apartment without an actual tour this week.

Once I get the last few tours filmed this week, I will have the prospective tenant view those prior to booking a tour, and feel this will likely reduce the number of tours this season.  I'll probably continue this practice moving forward.

Since we show occupied units, I never have an open house- too much risk of some unknown person swiping something that belongs to a tenant.  Even when I have an empty unit, I prefer scheduled tours- showing up on time and being able to communicate with me are part of my screening process, and I feel it's safer for me too.

Hope that helps.

Get the work done and have them pull the permit afterwards.  For emergency repairs, like replacing a hot water heater, pulling the permit after the fact is permissable in my area.

We have been adding washers and dryers to as many apartments as possible if they didn't already have access to laundry.

In our area, in unit laundry adds about $50/month to the rent whether they are paying for the natural gas and electricity or not (we pay for the water at all our units).  One of our tenants with one child told us that they had been paying $60/month at the laundry mat to do their laundry, they are much happier now that they have it in their home.

In my experience, renting an apartment that at least has access to laundry it much easier than one without.

Repairs have been fairly rare- though I did have to put $125 worth of parts into a washer that is used by 4 apartments last week, plus spent a few hours figuring out what was wrong and how to fix it (torn seal on the front loader making it leak, and coin trap jammed up with paper money and a guitar pick causing it not to drain).  We live near repairclinic.com, so I am able to buy most parts the same day I need them, and return anything I don't need for free.

Same with Theresa, here it's normal to provide appliances, including the washer and dryer if there are hook ups for it.  We have added laundry to several apartments and increased the rent for them.  The rent increase pays for the machines and infrastructure within 2 years, and the apartment is much easier to lease when it has laundry included.

I am not sure how much I'd like tenants hauling appliances in and out of our apartments, and being responsible for hooking them up- they do enough damage just moving furniture!  

We allow cats (up to two) with an increased security deposit.  Our deposit is normally one month's rent, we do 1.5x monthly rent with cats (which is the max for Michigan).   Cats can do a lot of damage- scratching trim, peeing, etc.  but I'd be missing out on a lot of great tenants if we banned them.  We have been replacing all carpet with hardwood or laminate, and found that Odor Xit helps eliminate any lingering odor issues we've encountered.

I don't like charging a fee monthly, or a specific pet fee/ deposit, in my experience these added payments make some tenants think that any damage caused by their animal is covered by these fees. 

We don't allow dogs since I don't want to deal with barking dog complaints, dog poop in the yard, or growling dogs when I am fixing things, inspecting, or showing the apartment.  Critters that gnaw on things are a hard no, I'd be ok with a small fish tank or lizards or something, but will take that on a case by case basis.

Interesting, thanks Kevin for the info.  Is it $9.99/week per listing, or per company?  

I had two applicants that were fairly well known to me- they were referrals from some of our awesome long term tenants.  They were applying for one of my apartments, but hadn't paid the background check fee yet, so I had them go through Zillow's application process instead.  I had to list the apartment and invite them to apply, and I am fairly happy with the results.  Two things are lacking compared to when I use rentecdirect.com (charges $29.45 directly to me)- there is no formal notification that they haven't been evicted, or had someone file on them for eviction.  The applicant just indicates that they hadn't had any evictions and I don't see anywhere that it is formally checked, so I searched the local court records and found they had no eviction records as they indicated.  The other thing I don't like is that I would not be given their SSN, just the last 4 digits.  My plan is to ask for this information prior to signing a lease with a tenant going forward (I already have the SSNs for these ladies since it was on my application that they had already turned in).  I only imagine needing the SSN if I end up filing for an eviction or judgement against the tenant, and someday want to turn it over to collections.  You don't HAVE to have an SSN for that, but it'd be better to have it.  I've only had to do that once, and only because I stupidly didn't follow my own screening guidelines and rented to a tenant with an eviction in her past and a sob story to go with it ;)

Hi Robby,

I found your post while searching to see if anyone is using Zillow to collect rent, and thought I'd chime in my 2c.

I list my properties for rent on my website, then craigslist and zillow (which sends them on to hotpads and trulia), and it's free. 

I have a couple of pending applications now so I decided to try their screening program, which charges the applicant $29, and they can 'use' the application for 30 days at other properties listed on zillow.  I had been charging $45, then paying a screening company $29.45 for the criminal/credit/ eviction portion.  I'll still verify employment and talk to past and current landlords, but I I am hoping using their app will generate some more applicants instead of asking them to pay a separate fee to apply for one of my apartments.  I'll let you know what I think.

I use Quickbooks for invoicing rent, and the desktop version just increased ACH transfers from $1 to $3 per transaction.  Since they don't seem to be improving their service at all, I am shopping around for alternative payment methods and was hoping to find someone who had been using zillow.

Hi all,

We are currently under contract to purchase a 4 unit home, and we measured the building and found that it was not as large as the City property records state.  We got the seller to lower the price (a little) and it makes money at that price.  We were under the impression that the appraiser would actually measure the building as well (we recently had refinanced another property, and that appraiser measured the house), but she didn't.  

There is a floor plan with some dimensions on it in the appraisal, plus a list of area calculations that conveniently add up to what the City has stated for square footage, but most dimensions are off by 3-5 feet, so for the two story house we are talking about a difference of 688 sq ft- they are saying it is 2770 sq ft, we calculated 2084 sq ft.  The City states that it has a 1086 sq ft basement (we got 1087 from our measurements), and the square footage of the entire foundation is 1165 according to the City and 1209 sq ft according to our measurements (a 3.8% difference).  Even if the first and second floors had the same footprint (they don't), the building couldn't be larger than twice the foundation size, or 2418 sq ft.

We still want to move forward since the property makes money at the price we had agreed on, but I was wondering if there was anything that could (or should) be done to follow up with the appraiser on why she didn't actually do her job.  I would think the lender would have an issue with them not actually measuring the property, especially when the numbers the City states already don't add up.

I'd appreciate any thoughts or experiences with similar issues.

Thanks,

Kelly

In my opinion, she would owe you for 30 days after the notice that she moved out.  

As of March 4, you were planning on the end of April from a verbal comment.

As of March 23, you have it in writing that you agreed to the end of April, she responded ok.

Then, at the end of March, she is out of the unit without any prior notice about it being early.  If you found out on the 30th that she was out, then she owes for the first 29 days of April (30 days after the notice- in this case after she vacated).  Prorate April's rent accordingly, for 30 days after whatever date you found out she was out.  I type the equation right there on the invoice so it is completely clear what is being paid for.

IF the unit isn't already rented, you now change the date that the apartment is available in your listings, and do what you can to "mitigate the loss" by trying to get someone in asap.  You do not have to move heaven and earth, but you do have to give it a good effort.  You do not have to lower your standards though.  

So now, technically, she is renting the unit til April 29.  If you are able to get someone in early, say the 15th, then she gets a credit for the days that they are renting- you can't collect rent twice for the same time period.   No double dipping (here in Michigan anyways, other states may differ).  The new tenant pays for the time they are leasing the unit, she pays for the time until then, or until April 29, whichever is the lesser amount.

Where it might get a little sticky is the time before the new tenant moves in that you may be using to fix up the unit and clean.  I usually allow 2-3 days if there is nothing major that needs to be done, and I don't charge anyone for this time between tenants- just part of doing business.  If the unit was left clean and without needing repairs, then you could charge her rent right up until the new tenant moves in.  If you are working on the unit and charging her rent for that time, I would think that wouldn't hold up in court, so I wouldn't be charging her rent for those days.

So, I would have invoiced her for the 29 days of April, with that rent due April 1 as usual, and late if I don't have it by the 5th.  If she was communicating with me, I might let it slide a little knowing that she may not owe the whole amount, and if I knew there was going to be enough of her security deposit left to cover the amount due.  She needs to give you her forwarding address within 4 days of moving out, then you need to return her remaining deposit with whatever deductions were made within 30 days of move out.  I usually try to turn them around quickly, but in this case I would wait to make sure the rent issue was settled before sending it out.