Are there less tenants out there? Or is it my imagination. 22 posts by 11 users

Posted: 03/27/2008 at 04:36PM

Is it my imagination or are there less tenants than there used to be. I was wondering if others where experiencing the same thing. I bought my first rental house in 1992 and it was so easy to rent that all I had to do was put a ad in the paper with a open house time and I would have twenty people come to the house. And they came there on time! Most of the time I did not even need a ad because when prepared the house for rent by painting etc... I would have many people stop by and ask if I was renting. Now the same house takes longer to rent and it is even in better condition than it was then. Now a ad might generate a couple of calls and one or two people looking at the property. That house is not the only one that is harder to rent, all my properties are generally harder to rent. It might be that it is easier to buy a home and less people are renting or something. That is just a theory I thought about

Posted: 03/29/2008 at 10:14AM

is it not enough renters? or too many rental properties?

Posted: 03/29/2008 at 11:54AM

Only problem I've gotten the past couple months is....it's cold. Tenants tend to not want to move when it's cold so de facto...leases aren't turning this time of year. Couple more weeks and it will pick up. Got 8 calls in 1 day last week off a 4 line newspaper ad. It's coming.

Posted: 03/31/2008 at 04:15PM

It's funny but it is not just this time of year. It has been years now. every thing is slower when you are trying to rent a house around Akron Ohio and nearby communities. Maybe it is true that there are a lot more rental properties out there than before.

Posted: 04/01/2008 at 12:21PM

Being a landlord isn't as much fun as it used to be.

I used to fnd decent human beings to rent from me with very little down time. Often, the next tenant was already signed up before the old tenant was out.

The past couple of years the quality of applicants has been frightening. Where do those people come from? I took over 125 applicantions on a vacancy last summer. No income, no job, 38 accounts in collection, multiple evictions, drug convictions, pit-bulls, 6 roomates none with jobs..... nobody you can rent to in that lot.

This winter, the callers are practically non-existant and the majority of them are telling me they only want a place for about 6 months because they are planning on buying. I won't tke a tenant when I know for sure they are going to move in 2-4 months.

Posted: 04/02/2008 at 06:58PM

PNW,

I get about 30-40 calls every day. We've got lots of tenants a little farther south here in Ohio. I'll send you a few. Would you like a crack dealer? Hooker turning tricks to support her meth habit? Criminal just released from prison last week? 20 year old who had 4 misdemeanors " when she was younger" ? Two 30 year olds shacking up with their 6 kids, both working at Burger King for less than a month? Just let me know which ones you want. I'll rent a bus and ship them your way!

Better yet, you can have them all, and I'll throw in a busload of low-life contingency lawyers.

Mike

Posted: 04/06/2008 at 10:24AM

Nationwidepi,

Yes, the tenant pool is lousy at this point. That's why we screen the tenants and only take the ones that are qualified. Our expenses are not high and in fact are right in line with the average for properly run residential rentals. The fact that you don't understand this business doesn't change any of the facts associated with it.

Do you actually own any rentals or just sell them to newbies? From looking at your website, it looks like the latter.

Mike

Posted: 04/07/2008 at 05:13AM

Wrong again Mike. as I have answered this same question for you in other posts, I am a landlord, I just choose to have different investments than you.

So far, you've only said that you have 2 residential rentals? Do you actually operate other residential rentals? Do you operate your own commercial multi-unit residential buildings? If so, why not tell us what you do?

Be careful casting dispersions before knowing who I am or what you are talking about.

I am not casting " dispersions" . I am asking you to explain YOUR claims for the benefit of everyone on the forum. That's what a forum is about and so far you are being very elusive.

I understand your 50% rule of thumb completely, I just do not think it is accurate for all investments and I make a personal choice to use other calculations.

I have said on numerous occassions that the 50% rule is simply a way of stating that the operating expenses in the United States for residential rentals run (average) 45% to 50% per year over time. As Beachbum said, nothing can predict exactly what the expenses will be for a given unit in a given year because there are too many unknowns. However, the 50% rule is a good rule of thumb over the long term when you're running a serious rental property business.

I have never claimed that the 50% rule is accurate for all investments. It is certainly not intended for strip malls, retail space, office space, raw land, etc, etc, etc.

Mike

Posted: 04/07/2008 at 06:35AM

When I say the tenant pool is lousy, I mean that I can't accept the vast majority of the applicants that I screen. The primary reasons that I deny tenants are previous evictions and criminal history. As just one of an infinite number of examples, I had a guy call last night that wanted to look at one of my rentals. Since I was at home and my computer was on, I asked his name and then quickly checked his history. He had been evicted twice and had 3 full pages of criminal history including receiving stolen property, theft, domestic violence, etc, etc, etc.

Obviously, I wouldn't accept this person as a tenant. In my business, I find that about 90% of tenants at any one time are good tenants; another 9% have some issues, but not to the extent that I would evict them; and the final 1% we evict each month. That one percent includes all the inherited tenants we've gotten when we take over buildings. I estimate that we evict only about .3% to .5% of tenants I have screened.

Mike

Posted: 04/07/2008 at 07:21AM

Mike, did you check his criminal history with just his name? Did you need his social? Which online service did you use?

Thanks