All Forum Posts by: Christina Venegas

Happy Thursday, Christina,

More than happy to help you.

“A notice to terminate a property management agreement allows an owner to void their contract with a property manager. In most agreements, there is a kick-out clause that allows either party to cancel the agreement with sufficient notice provided, usually 30 days.”

Do you have an agreement? You can email me, and I will review it before any action.

Pl take a look: https://eforms.com/property-management/termination-notice/

or you can search for another form on google.

Or you can create using this as an example.

The best way to do next. And keep it as a record.

1. Email them notice of termination ( if you do not have an email, call and ask or check at the company website or look at the contract or any other paperwork from them). Official request of contract termination.
2. Send a post with a notice of termination - to be good, register that mail. Mail that is recorded in the post office where it is mailed and then recorded again in each post office it reaches, and that is treated with special care.
3. Call them, and inform them that you sent a notice of termination.

When you do these steps, they need to return all keys and provide you with a written confirmation. The next step is creating a new company with the current client’s recommendation.

Leona

@Christina Venegas how well did you screen this PMC before hiring them? Guessing you either went with the cheapest or first one you found - which is too common!

Even if someone give you a referral, what meets their expectations, may not meet yours.

In our experience, the #1 mistake owners make when selecting a Property Management Company (PMC) is ASSUMING instead of CONFIRMING.

It's often a case of not doing enough research, as they don't know what they don't know!

Owners mistakenly ASSUME all PMCs offer the exact SAME SERVICES and PERFORM those services EXACTLY THE SAME WAY, so price is the only differentiator.

So, the first question they usually ask a PMC is about fees - instead of asking about services and HOW those services are executed.

EXAMPLE: PMC states they will handle tenant screening – what does that specifically mean? What documents do they require, what credit scores do they allow, how do they verify previous rental history, etc.? You’d be shocked by how little actual screening many PMC’s do!

This also leads owners to ASSUME simpler is better when it comes to management contracts.

The reality is the opposite - if it's not in writing then the PMC doesn't have to provide the service or can charge extra for it!

We have a 14-page management contract that we've added our real experiences to over the years, with the intent of protecting both us AND the landlord. Beyond the Monthly Management, Placement & Maintenance fees, all other fees in our contract are IF EVENT -> THEN fees.

We don’t know any PMCs to recommend in the area mentioned, but since selecting the wrong PMC is usually more harmful than selecting a bad tenant, you might want to read our series about “How to Screen a PMC Better than a Tenant”:

https://www.biggerpockets.com/member-blogs/3094/91877-how-to-screen-a-pmc-better-than-a-tenant-part-1-services-and-processes

We recommend you get management contracts from several PMCs and compare the services they cover and, more importantly, what they each DO NOT cover.

EDUCATE YOURSELF - yes, it will take time, but will lead to a selection that better meets your expectations & avoids potentially costly surprises!

P.S. If you just hire the cheapest or first PMC you speak with and it turns into a bad experience, please don’t assume ALL PMC’s are bad and start trashing PMC’s in general. Take ownership of your mistake and learn to do the proper due diligence recommended above😊

Please send us any feedback via email, as we do not use the DM feature here.

Quote from @Christina Venegas:

If something similar happed to you share what you did to solve that propblem. this year i bought my first investment property out of state. i live in california and i bough it in chicago, i hired a property management to handle the house and the tenant since im not going to be in chicago. the first month the tenant was late on her rent and i had to call and remind the property management to do something about it, that was the fist month. the second month the same thing happend i had to call and text management to remind them of the rent i always have to remind them. every month the tenant pays extra which is the late fee and they keep it because supposedly they are the ones who make calls but i feel that if i dont call them they wont do anything about it and also i found out that the tenant had not yet paid the water bill. so i called the management office to tell them that they need to reemind the tenant to pay her bill and the owner answered and said that theres is nothing to worry about. they are not gonna send me to collection if the bill is not gonna be paid, he said even is under my name. so i told him that he need it to remind the tenant to pay the bill anyway. its been four months that i have that tenant in the house and she always pays late. this month of december i havent received my rent yet. i'm new in this investment world and i want to know what you guys think. am i doing something wrong here?  or i have the wrong property management? what shoul i do

 From the way you tell your story it seems that the tenant can't afford the rent on your property. You may need to consider eviction. Also, it's the PM's job to ensure that everything is running smoothly and he's being paid for it. I would recommend that you should find other options in getting a better one. I'd ask your local real estate agents about any recommendations they could give you to increase your chances in finding a PM that will do their job the right wi jusrt 

Ijust don't know how to tell my property management that i no longer want to work with them

Quote from @Christina Venegas:

If something similar happed to you share what you did to solve that propblem. this year i bought my first investment property out of state. i live in california and i bough it in chicago, i hired a property management to handle the house and the tenant since im not going to be in chicago. the first month the tenant was late on her rent and i had to call and remind the property management to do something about it, that was the fist month. the second month the same thing happend i had to call and text management to remind them of the rent i always have to remind them. every month the tenant pays extra which is the late fee and they keep it because supposedly they are the ones who make calls but i feel that if i dont call them they wont do anything about it and also i found out that the tenant had not yet paid the water bill. so i called the management office to tell them that they need to reemind the tenant to pay her bill and the owner answered and said that theres is nothing to worry about. they are not gonna send me to collection if the bill is not gonna be paid, he said even is under my name. so i told him that he need it to remind the tenant to pay the bill anyway. its been four months that i have that tenant in the house and she always pays late. this month of december i havent received my rent yet. i'm new in this investment world and i want to know what you guys think. am i doing something wrong here?  or i have the wrong property management? what shoul i do

 Hey, Christina, I am so sorry to hear about your problem, Yes, it’s an investment property, and property management is well-paid for the job. 1. You need to terminate the current agreement with management and find a new one, and it’s good to get a couple of recommendations before. When you communicate with the new management, ask them to provide you with one contact of current clients and call them ( it’s standard practice). 2. You need to review the rental agreement for the terms regarding the delay. It's a different state.
I can find out for you some companies by recommendations.
Leona

@Christina Venegas my guess is that you have the wrong property manager here. With that being said, which area of Chicago is this in? In a lot of C or D class areas it can be very common to have habitual late payment of rent. A good property manager can help, but it sounds like this tenant can't afford the rent. 

The water bill is something you will want to make sure is paid up. If you have a tenant leave, you will still have to pay that water bill... it transfers with the property here in the Chicago area unlike other utilities like electric or gas. 

You should connect with @Mark Ainley.  Either his company GC Realty can help you manage, or he will know the right PM company to refer you to. He runs a meetup for PM companies, so he knows everyone. 

Quote from @Christina Venegas:

If something similar happed to you share what you did to solve that propblem. this year i bought my first investment property out of state. i live in california and i bough it in chicago, i hired a property management to handle the house and the tenant since im not going to be in chicago. the first month the tenant was late on her rent and i had to call and remind the property management to do something about it, that was the fist month. the second month the same thing happend i had to call and text management to remind them of the rent i always have to remind them. every month the tenant pays extra which is the late fee and they keep it because supposedly they are the ones who make calls but i feel that if i dont call them they wont do anything about it and also i found out that the tenant had not yet paid the water bill. so i called the management office to tell them that they need to reemind the tenant to pay her bill and the owner answered and said that theres is nothing to worry about. they are not gonna send me to collection if the bill is not gonna be paid, he said even is under my name. so i told him that he need it to remind the tenant to pay the bill anyway. its been four months that i have that tenant in the house and she always pays late. this month of december i havent received my rent yet. i'm new in this investment world and i want to know what you guys think. am i doing something wrong here?  or i have the wrong property management? what shoul i do

1st thing you should do is hire another property manager. The tenant paying late every month is not an issue for me.  If the wants to pay extra every month that's on the tenant.  But what your property manager told you about the water bill is wrong.  The water company will file a collection against the owner of the property- you.  That bad advice from your property manager is why he should be fired.

Interview a new property manager first.  Get them in place then fire the old one.

Hey @Christina Venegas - First off, congrats on getting into the real estate space, I know personally about the struggle getting started.  I have never heard of a PM not passing on the late fee to the owner, that sounds fishy to me, but I could be wrong.

I can 2nd @John Warren and recommend connecting with @Mark Ainley who already provided some great points above.  Additionally, I always suggest talking to a couple of industry professionals so maybe also reach out to @Jason Marcordes and @Jared Kott who are both Chicago property managers as well.

@Christina Venegas my guess is that you have the wrong property manager here. With that being said, which area of Chicago is this in? In a lot of C or D class areas it can be very common to have habitual late payment of rent. A good property manager can help, but it sounds like this tenant can't afford the rent. 

The water bill is something you will want to make sure is paid up. If you have a tenant leave, you will still have to pay that water bill... it transfers with the property here in the Chicago area unlike other utilities like electric or gas. 

You should connect with @Mark Ainley.  Either his company GC Realty can help you manage, or he will know the right PM company to refer you to. He runs a meetup for PM companies, so he knows everyothanks for the information