All Forum Posts by: Tavares L.

1. Use an online portal for maintenance requests and communication like apartments use. Apartments.com is the one that I use.

2. Read your lease thoroughly and update it with everything you are experiencing with this Tenant. Be sure to investigate local landlord-tenant laws. 

3. Review local landlord and tenant laws to discover which maintenance requests are considered urgent, non-urgent, or can wait.

4. Get a Google voice number and establish an auto-reply. This will avoid you from being reached directly and lets the tenant know that you will review it ASAP.

5. Update your lease by extracting some terms and conditions from other apartment leases, lease share here on Bp or etc. that are found online.

6. Never tell your tenants that you are abroad or out of state.  I manage from abroad and have found that some tenants use this as leverage. 

7. Avoid doing 2-year leases. This decreases suffering from business relationships that are not favorable. 

8. Create a Maintenance Responsibility Addendum that lists items such as the irrigation systems, HVAC upkeep and filters, plumbing, electrical, and appliances. Balance risk vs reward on this one.

These are some of the lessons I learned from managing abroad or long distance.  

I just went to the exact same thing here in Texas. Although I knew that charging less than comparable rents was cheating my business, I still ran the numbers.

Can your savings cover the vacancy rate and turnover? If so, don't fear not being able to locate another quality tenant at the expense of cheating your business. 

On my Airbnb, I use Ring doorbell that provides a wired or battery-operated functionality. I prefer wired, which is just swapping the low voltage doorbell wires from the existing doorbell to the Ring doorbell.

No issues.

I have a ring doorbell and soon to be Ring Floodlights on the front of my property for my Airbnb. In my listing, I highlight the location of the surveillance. It provides awareness and some form of security.

@Wayne Bodley How did this situation work out for you? I am facing the same challenges.

I decided to run a credit check, rental history, and background check to identify any issues. Also, I consider their debt to income ratio, separately. This ratio will provide an IDEA of the probability of rent payments issues, if they were to separate.

@Todd Worrich Considering all expenses, would you earn more profit from a short term Airbnb or 12-month lease? I considering an Airbnb for a SFH near Sea World and Lackland area.

Airbnb has a Help Center that provides specific information about short term rentals in San Antonio. 

 https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2517/san-antonio--tx

Hi,

Here is a checklist that was posted in the File forum.

https://www.biggerpockets.com/files/user/brandonat...

I doubt it since you have not purchased the unit yet. Definitely, after you purchase the unit

https://www.buildium.com/blog/using-smartphones-fo...