Comments on: How to Market / Advertise a Rental Property

By: Paul

Paul — Wed, 28 May 2008 12:24:41 +0000

Never accept a tenant just to get the place rented.

Truer words have never been spoken. I owned a rental for about six years. The first tenants were alright, although the place was overloaded with stuff when they were living there. They broke their lease and forfeited the security deposit.

The next tenant was a disaster, he was growing pot in the basement and skipped town, ended up leaving his girlfriend holding the bag as it were (or at least that is her story).

Anyway, after that I went through a real estate agent for the rest of my tenants. The real estate agent was great because she ran background checks and did a very through screening. It was well worth the one month’s rent to have good tenants.

By: Fred

Fred — Tue, 27 May 2008 22:20:36 +0000

Leslie - all good tips… Some of those will be the subject of a future post on how to evaluate tenants… good to have them here as well, you’ve hit the big ones for identifying a good tenant.

Tyler - Sorry that you learned this the hard way. That said, even among those that rate worthy (credit, income, reference letters) … there’s still a few that will cause serious damage to a property — that’s just part of the risk of being a Landlord. (That said, if you’ve done your homework, my guess is that this risk is in the <5% chance range).

Amalie - I'm sure you can do it. IMO, not knowing your situation, you are better to look seriously at comparables in your area to determine a market rental price -- then see if you can afford the property based on that. That way, if a friend doesn't work out, you'll have the entire renting community interested in your property as well. There are certain other risks in having friends rent your property... and that all comes down to what type of friends they are, how secure their income is, how responsible they are, etc. If you can find a friend that meets strict criteria, it's always nice to be able to rent to someone you know and trust.

Finally, I didn't link to it here, but I recently posted the lease agreement we use for our tenants. Feel free to use anything from it when you’re developing your own agreement.

By: Amalie

Amalie — Tue, 27 May 2008 15:23:34 +0000

Such a timely post! I just this morning posted on the blog abut a property we’re looking at to buy as a rental. We’re putting out feelers to the people we know who are looking to rent first, but if we were to have to cast a wider net, as you say, this list will be a great reference! That’s only if we can muster up the nerve to plunge into an investment in this market in the first place…shudder.

By: Tyler

Tyler — Tue, 27 May 2008 14:37:34 +0000

Very helpful! Great article. I will refer back to it once we’re ready to jump off the deep end again. LOL.

I agree wholeheartedly with point #2 up at the top - it will cost waaaaay less to cover a month’s rent of and wait for the right tenant than to accept any old tenant. We learned that lesson to the tune of $12,000 (thankfully, our portion of that was only the deductable). Interestingly, the mortgage payment would have cost us only $200 more than the deductable, and would have saved us a second month of vacancy while contractors worked to restore the damages.

By: Leslie

Leslie — Tue, 27 May 2008 13:27:21 +0000

Great list! As a former landlord, I’d add simply:
~ Don’t feel that you must accept the first tenant that comes along, especially if you’re getting a lot of interest. You’re allowed to pick and choose from interested applicants as long as you don’t illegally discriminate.
~ If it’s legal in your area, get first AND last month’s rent AND a security deposit. Too often tenants skip payment on the last month’s rent, thinking that you’ll just keep the deposit instead.
~ Get a credit report, paid for by the tenant. No credit is actually a better choice than recent really bad credit. Look at the specifics, not the rating.