All Forum Posts by: Austin F.

My advice as a self-manager, and a person is

1. Just leave. Landlords, leases, penalties and all that nonsense can be worked out on the back end. Right now she is living with someone who is threatening her personhood, mental health, and physical well-being, you can't put a price on freedom from that threat.

2. Call the property manager immediately after and tell them what you wrote in this post. I know Michigan has a statute about physical abuse and what your rights are, but beyond that it would take one calloused land lord to try and hold you to a lease with an abuser. Ask them what your options are, it's all speculation until you talk to them.

3. Talk to her, make sure she is okay, be supportive but not pushy, this is social worker stuff. Abuse is a VERY delicate issue, and there are lots of resources for the abused, and friends and family supporting the abused, seek them out.

Good luck

Innago allows you to pay with a credit card. There is a fee to the tenant I'm fairly sure, but that is just the cost for added security I suppose...

The tenant does not have good reason to be wary, this is the way the world works now, the systems are secure as they can be.

Generic tour requests are pretty normally dead ends for me. Most qualified tenants will have questions included in their messages.

If I'm busy I'll often ignore the standard "so and so has requested a tour". If I'm not busy I usually message back something to the tune of "Before we take the time to schedule a tour please give me a call at xxx so I can answer any questions you may have".

Get it listed and see what offers come in, don't go down with the ship on this one. If you can walk away at zero it was a learning experience and probably worth it.

Or try and do work yourself. Can you move in and get a roommate? Other ways to cut costs? There's also the chance its just a money pit and you should get off at the nearest exit. 

I think we're in for a bumpy 2 or more years. Can't repress interest rates and shove money into the economy for that long and not get this on the other side.

The bad investors will get flushed out, and the good ones will hang on and come out the other side with a few more grey hairs. Buckle up. 

Quote from @Bruce Woodruff:

what the benefit is to a property owner to have a literal stranger sublet their house to a whole bunch of other strangers and pocket the difference in rent profit?

Isn't this exactly what a property management company does?

They're basically a PMC that pays you MORE in rent as opposed to taking a 10%+ cut. Higher reward, higher risk as with all investments.

I personally think its silly and would never go for it, but someone else surely has a different opinion.

Required here. $135 to register, and that includes your first inspection which is good for 3 years, then reinspections are something like $25 every 3 years, and the inspector will only charge you once if you do all your properties at the same time.

The registration is run by the fire department, so they focus exclusively on fire code compliance. Beeping smoke detectors, opening windows, railings, egress windows etc. The same guy does it every time, and we have good rapport so if I miss something in my walk through I just have to email him a picture of the fix and he'll mail my registration. Benefits of living in a small town I suppose. Fire codes are rules that actually matter so I have no issues complying, and am very supportive.

Quote from @James Bartlett:

Quote from @Austin F.:

"Out of respect for the current tenants, there are no showings without approved application, there is a $40 application fee which will be credited towards your first months rent if/when you sign a lease."

That's my old line if you want to be nice and credit the app fee, the market changed here and the fee is not credited anymore.

I also provide a google drive link with 20+ photos of the property, and a few video walk throughs so the prospective client has a good idea what they are getting into.

I've also found everyone wants a showing, serious prospects will have a few good relevant questions first. I usually say "before you submit an application do you have any questions about the property?" Especially to Zillow leads where they can request a showing and an application in one click. Other listing sites have fewer false leads, or are easier to filter right away. 

How do you initially charge an application fee? You'll have to forgive me ignorance. I've had almost 1k tenants as a property manager using short term rentals but landlording is very new to me.

I just do a regular application with background check, credit check etc. The same application someone would fill out if they were moving forward with the lease. This is if they pass my basic pre-screen (conversation etc.), I use Innago for my applications, and the fee is only to cover the cost of those checks, I do not profit.

I may pass up some good tenants this way, but I manage remotely, and pay someone to do my showings, so the fewer I have to do the better. I also do year leases starting in May, and do my leasing in February, so there is plenty of time to sift through candidates. I try not to accept more than one application at a time, and 95% of the time the first applicant gets the unit.

"Out of respect for the current tenants, there are no showings without approved application, there is a $40 application fee which will be credited towards your first months rent if/when you sign a lease."

That's my old line if you want to be nice and credit the app fee, the market changed here and the fee is not credited anymore.

I also provide a google drive link with 20+ photos of the property, and a few video walk throughs so the prospective client has a good idea what they are getting into.

I've also found everyone wants a showing, serious prospects will have a few good relevant questions first. I usually say "before you submit an application do you have any questions about the property?" Especially to Zillow leads where they can request a showing and an application in one click. Other listing sites have fewer false leads, or are easier to filter right away. 

Get an Experian account too, its free if you click the right things, then you will have all 3 agencies monitored. I found errors on Experian that weren't reported on Equifax or TransUnion, sure was a surprise to have my loan broker tell me I had 8 accounts in collections when they pulled my Experian report.