DIY Landlord and investor

[Liran Dori]

Hi everyone — glad to be here.

I’m a Florida-based landlord who self-manages a small rental portfolio. As my portfolio has grown, I’ve noticed that while self-managing makes sense, it also starts to feel messy and time-consuming in ways that aren’t always obvious at first.

I’m not selling anything, just looking to connect with other landlords who self-manage and hear about the parts of the process you find most frustrating or inefficient.

At what point did self-managing start to feel harder for you, and what do you find most annoying about it today? 

What will be the turning point which at you will consider a property manager?

Looking forward to learning from your experiences.

[Drew Sygit]

Some common problems DIY landlords face as they grow:

1) Communication Constraints: your day job doesn't always allow you to focus on landord issues

2) Accounting: spreadsheets can be used, but unless you master Excel, can be a challenge. *RentRedi and other cheap services can help better organize.

3) Tenant Payments: paper checks are too old-school and a pain.
*Encourage tenants to use Zelle, Venmo, Paypal, etc. 
ACH is best, but requires PM software

4) Maintenance: the scourge of landlords & PMCs!
*Try to encourage tenants to submit all MNT requests in writing, preferrably via email, but SMS is their preference.
- If you allow SMS, suggest you check with your provider to see if you can access somehow online for tracking purposes. Otherwise, set up a Google Voice number, which allows this.

5) Evictions: hopefully you don't have to deal with these.
*You should save the online links to your state's nonpayment notices, so you can quickly access, complete and mail when needed.

6) Showings: a pain to talk to all prospects, answering their questions that tell you they didn't even bother to read your ad. Then, you have at least 25% no-shows.
*Check out online scheduling at least! Look into Self-Showings if possible.

7) Application Screenings: another time-suck!
*We don't recommend using a service that only gives you "Approved, Maybe or Deny" responses. They rarely check everything that should be considered.