adding your first employee? when?

Question

My partner and I both work 40-50 hr a week jobs and we currently have 20 rental units (5 properties) right now we seem to be able to handle 20 sets of tenants( my partner does) I mostly fix stuff and work with the contractors.

My first question is when do you hire your first employee? how many sets of tenants/units/houses?

Do you first hire them on a part time basis?

Should you hire someone or just hire a contractor? ( for fixing)

right now our business is only rentals we don't do any flips.

any advice would be great.

Mike

David Niles · Answer

Hi Mike, great to see another Buffalonian here!  The problem with a part time employee in this field is, your work is part time for them too and may not meet up with your needs when you need them.

I would analyze exactly what part is eating up the most of your time and go from there.  
Have you guys thought about hiring property management?

Tevis Verrett · Answer

Michael Sherwood have you thought about a virtual assistant?  Mine is in India, works on projects as I need her, and is indispensable.

She handles emails, Quickbooks accounting, and even researches strategic plane tix for me at my whim.

The best in outsourcing biz is Tim Ferriss' recommendation of BrickworkIndia.com

Hope this helps,

Tevis

Michael Sherwood · Answer

Right now the repair stuff is not too bad honestly. I think we are trying to be forward looking on this. My partner is handling the phone calls/tenant issue (late payers) If we decide to evict them I help out my partner (probably because I am the more intimidating one :) and get them out.  ) We also have a lot of book keeping that needs to be done, we have our own income statement set up in excel that tracks all of this and following our taxes this year we plan to create a balance sheet (to track equity)

We have thought about property management but I am not sure how much ballpark that will cost us.

thanks

Mike