Managing Properties And Tenants More Efficiently

In all the studies that we’ve done and all that we’ve read up on and the feedback that we’ve gotten from our own users and users throughout the property management space, the number one factor in managing properties and managing tenants more efficiently, seems to us to be communicating guidelines, communicating rules and sticking to those rules and those guidelines. Finding a good system, I’m not referring just to a software base system but a good system in place for management and communication piece and making sure that everything is clearly defined for your tenants is critical to managing your properties and managing your tenants more efficiently. Many landlords know that the most obvious example of course is late fees. Once you give them a little bit, they’ll take a lot. But that’s true for a lot of different pieces when it comes to property management and managing your tenants. Make sure, whatever property manager you put in place that they have a clearly defined set of rules and expectations for their tenants and that they also reflect those clearly defined rules and expectations with the way that they treat you as the investor or is the owner of the property as well.

Well, I mean, software generally helps in this aspect, because software’s going to automate a lot of these different pieces whether it’s reminding tenants when rent is due, whether it’s automating late fee process. Whether it’s enforcing those late fees once they do hit or tracking when leases have been opened, signed, etc. Software’s going to help a lot but even just sitting down and having a property manager give you a list of their rules and how they manage and how they enforce, can be a great way for them to articulate to you how they’re going to approach managing your property. A lot of landlords or a lot of property managers may say yeah, I do that, I’ll take care of that, no problem. They might not have that clearly defined set of rules and as they grow as a property manager, as they add personnel, you know as a business owner yourself, it gets harder and harder internally to enforce those best practices when it comes to management. If they can demonstrate to you that they have clearly thought about this, that it’s not just something that they talk about or not just something that they intuitively know how to do, that’s something they can communicate down the line within their organization, continually enforce with their tenants and their properties, that’s going to go a long way. When you’re evaluating property manager, another great thing to do is ask for them to give you that list, show you, what do you do when this type of situation arises, how are you going to communicate financials to me? How are you going to get rent to me, make sure that they agree to all that upfront in a very clear manner.

Listen to full episode:https://lifebridgecapital.com/2019/10/ws355-the-benefits-of-property-management-software-with-dave-spooner

There’s a lot of different structures and ways that landlords look at and consider different reports, they might call the same report or call different reports the same thing and you ask for a rent roll and you get something that you’re not really familiar with. The classic kind of most common definition of a rent roll is the future value and current value of all of your leased units. But a lot of landlords look at it as what’s owed and what’s been paid so far in this year. That’s just one example of a financial report that you might be saying one thing and your property manager is thinking a totally different thing. Again, software can help a lot with this because it formalizes these processes, it takes the rent and it puts it in a set manner that everybody is comfortable and familiar with. It also makes all of these reports transparent and visible for everybody. A good software package is going to allow you, as the owner or you as the – you know, somebody that’s investing the syndicate to see what the financial picture is of your property and pull those reports up at any time. Again, when you do set up with your property manager, originally, you should ask them for some sample reports. What are the reports you’re going to give me and go through it thoroughly and make sure you have a clear understanding of what everything means in those reports? And then ask them how you continue to have access to that, whether it’s, will I receive this monthly, will I receive this quarterly, can I log in at a time to a portal and see this type of thing. How do you have access and how do you continue to familiarize your stuff with that data?

Emailing is a totally fine way to go, the property manager can pull those reports for you and send them off to you and they do that in a timely manner and you’re comfortable and familiar with those, that is perfectly fine. Obviously the best case is typically when you can log in and see that yourself. Now, one word of caution and really saying this to look out for those property managers out there. It’s kind of like the stock market, they say that if you have the Yahoo Finance App, you shouldn’t be checking your stocks every day because you’ll make some knee jerk decisions based on some news or something that popped up and you might have properties that aren’t performing that well one month. Maybe it’s because the landlord hasn’t entered in the rent that’s been paid. Maybe there’s just a rash of tenants that are paying rent late and the property manager is trying to figure out how to deal with that. There’s kind of a double edged sword with having daily access, but it is important to have it when you need it. It’s important to have that access on demand when you need to generate reports, when you need to make a decision for a future investment or just to continue to funnel money into a specific investment. However, make sure that you’re not kind of back seat driving with your property manager, if you’re confident that you picked a good one, give them the space to make your properties more efficient and manage those a little bit better.

Listen to full episode: https://lifebridgecapital.com/2019/10/ws355-the-benefits-of-property-management-software-with-dave-spooner