5 Signs Landlording Is Not For You

Managing a rental property, along with its tenants, is a difficult and time consuming and a job not everyone is cut out for. In most cases, everyone might be better off hiring a property management company. Most investment property owners find hiring a management company unloads a lot of stress and responsibility.

WRITTEN & PUBLISHED BY: PPPM

Here are five signs you shouldn’t be managing your own rental property:

1. You can’t say ‘no.’ Being a lenient landlord can be very harmful to your business. There are a few things a landlord should just say ‘no’ too such as late rent, renting to the unemployed, or agree to bypass the credit check. If you crumble under confrontation or tears, it’s time to hire a property manager.

2. You’re disorganized or forgetful. If you have a busy life and find it hard to keep track of whether or not a tenant paid rent or you received a work order from them last week, or even last month, that is sign you need to hire a property manager. Being a negligent landlord is not only frustrating for you, but can frustrate the tenants and anyone else involved.

3. You are unfamiliar with housing and rental laws. Both state and federal housing and rental codes can be quite complicated. If you aren’t willing to learn the ins and outs to ensure your property is in compliance, it’s safer to hire a professional. Property managers know the housing’s legal systems and will help minimize the chances of a claim being filed against you.

4. You screen renters with ‘gut instinct.’ Not only can judging a renter based on looks, what car they drive, or how they speak can cause you trouble in the future for your business, but due to discrimination laws it can get you in trouble with the law. If you aren’t willing to start running credit checks, you should consider hiring a property manager. Management companies will have fair, unbiased systems when it comes to selecting tenants.

5. You let your tenants walk all over you. It is great to be a landlord who wants the tenants happy, but if they have the upper hand, you are not cut out for this job. Feeling threatened by your tenants or ignoring when they break the rules will only cause you further and greater problems. It is important to hire a property manager that the tenants will respect and will keep order in place.

See original article here: http://parkplaceid.com/blog/index.php/2012/07/5-signs-landlording-is-not-for-you/

Are you currently managing your own rental property and feel it’s time to hire a property management company? Call Charissa with Windermere Property Management:

Charissa Frerichs
______________________________
charissa@wpmsouth.com
Office: 253.638.9811 ext. 202
Direct: 206.458.4999
Fax: 253.638.0437
www.wpmsouth.com

WPM South, LLC – The Verdi Management Group
15215 SE 272nd St Suite 204, Kent WA 98042

Weekly Market Update: Dupre & Scott

Rents up, vacancies few

Renters have been saying loudly that rents are rising steeply and vacancies are few. Now comes fresh proof they’re right. Average rents in the…

By Elizabeth Rhodes
Seattle Times business reporter

Renters have been saying loudly that rents are rising steeply and vacancies are few. Now comes fresh proof they’re right.

Average rents in the region jumped almost 2 percent between the first and second quarters of this year and are now 9.1 percent higher than this time last year, reports apartment analyst Tom Cain, of Cain Inc. He surveys 149,000 King and Snohomish county apartments quarterly. The current two-county average is $1.14 per square foot, or $967 per unit. Meanwhile, the vacancy rate continues to drop, now at 4.24 percent for the two counties. Anything under 5 percent is considered tight.

“The rental market will continue to tighten as a result of job growth, in-migration and a combination of an insufficient amount of new construction to fill demand and apartments leaving the rental pool for conversion to condominiums,” says Cain, publisher of Apartment Insights Washington. Two areas — South Everett and Lynnwood — are leading with annual rent increases above 13 percent. Average rents in those communities are now $885 and $896 respectively for all size units combined, putting them still below the areawide average.

Four additional areas have seen rents climb 11 percent or more: East Bellevue, West Bellevue, Southwest Seattle and North Seattle between North 85th Street and North 145th Street. Some of these neighborhoods have lagged others in rent increases and are only now catching up. There are also some areas where increases have remained modest, Cain found. It’s “ironic,” he says, that affluent, fashionable Kirkland leads them.

Kirkland “has the unique distinction of having the highest rents and the highest vacancy rate over the past year,” he says. “It also has had the lowest annual rent increase on a percentage basis — 3.4 percent.” Cain attributes this to “price resistance among renters” who can find lower rents elsewhere. Kirkland’s average rent goes from $956 for a studio to $2,264 for a three-bedroom, Cain found. Compare that to nearby Redmond, where studios average $845 and a three-bedroom is $1,606.

Several other areas also reported below-average rent increases (but not necessarily below average rents). They are Des Moines, Kent, Sammamish, Issaquah, Arlington and Marysville. Each has experienced annual rent increases in the 5 percent range. In King County, the toughest places to find an apartment are in Seattle. The north-central part of the city has a vacancy rate of 1.88 percent — essentially a full house. Other neighborhoods with few vacancies are Queen Anne, Magnolia and Capitol Hill. South King County, from SeaTac to Federal Way, had above-average availability, with vacancies ranging from 4.5 to 6.3 percent. In Snohomish County, “Boeing’s Everett plant is having a substantial impact on this area,” Cain says, and that’s why its vacancy rate is falling faster than King County’s.

The tightest vacancy rate, 2.15 percent, was in Marysville and Monroe, he found. Eleven hundred apartments were converted to condos in the second quarter of this year. That’s slightly more than were replaced by new construction. “The level of converted units has surged in 2007,” Cain reports, with the highest conversion activity occurring on the Eastside. Seattle is a close second. Developers are constructing 2,231 units in properties with 50 or more units. Half are on the Eastside, 40 percent are in Seattle and the remainder are in South King County. An additional 8,000 units are in the planning stage.

Elizabeth Rhodes: erhodes@seattletimes.com

See original article here: http://seattletimes.com/html/realestate/2003788343_rents15.html

10 Ways to Welcome Home A New Tenant

Have you ever heard the saying, “A happy tenant, is a good tenant?”, or “First impressions matter?” Both of these saying are very true, especially when it comes to welcoming home your new tenant. The real estate and property management …

Is Buying a Home (or Rental Property) a Good Investment in 2013?

WRITTEN BY: Diana Hill
PUBLISHED BY: Online Trading Academy

One of the most common questions I receive is: “What will the real estate market do in the coming year?” Well, I don’t have a crystal ball, (wish I did) but I can look at data and see where things are trending. There are very few experts that don’t agree that the real estate market has hit its bottom and is on the rise. But what will the rise look like and will it be sustainable?

I read an article recently by Robert Aldana that likens what is happening in the real estate market to bouncing a basketball; he calls it the “basketball effect.” “Take a basketball and hold it up high, then drop it.  That first bounce is the basketball’s fastest upward bounce.  During that first bounce, it begins to travel slower the higher it rises.” Why this is relevant is that we are seeing the initial bounce in property values?

I do believe that an upward trend in values and sales will continue through 2013.  We will not see the appreciation acceleration at this same level however. I do think that we will continue to see good appreciation through the spring of this year.  As I’ve mentioned before, one of the things driving appreciation is the lack of inventory.  I think this year we will see more homes coming on the market that are standard sales not distressed sales. Once that happens, the market’s appreciation should slow to a healthy rate of 2-3 percent over the next few years. Please keep in mind that real estate is extremely localized and you need to consider how your area is doing with relationship to jobs, rents and other economic factors before making a buying decision.

One of the other driving factors in the market is household formation. Household formation, as I’ve talked about before, is increasing. The graph below demonstrates why it’s so important:

We have seen large growth after the almost historic shrinking in 2006. Growth started in 2010 with 357,000 new households, 2011 near a million, and it’s predicted that 2012 rose to over 1.3 million. This helps drive the residential sales market as well as the rental market.  But is it smarter to buy than to rent?  Let’s do the math:  if you purchase a $400,000 home with a FHA (Federal Housing Administration) loan, at 30 years with a fixed rate of 3.5 percent and put $14,000 down, it will cost approximately $1,733 a month (for principal and interest – you would also have to add on taxes and insurance).  In California taxes and insurance would cost you about $150 to $200 a month for a $400,000 home.

Once you add the tax deductions for mortgage interest and property taxes you are SAVING $500 a month and building your wealth. Another consideration is that your payment will remain fixed where rent will continue to rise as does the cost of living. Now if you are an investor and want to buy this house to use as a rental does that math still make sense?

Well, two things we should add to the equation is 1) appreciation of the asset 2) depreciation of the asset for tax purposes.  Right now our tax laws really benefit the landlord. If we use the same math with a mortgage payment plus taxes and insurance you are paying $2,640 a month, now subtract the tax break and appreciation you receive (about $1,100 a month) and your effective payment is $1,500. If you rent the property for $2,200 a month you will have a positive cash flow.  But now consider what that will look like 10 years down the road.

If you want to learn more about investing, make sure you register for my upcoming class in February.  It is online and there will be only one class a week for 4 weeks.

– Diana Hill

See article here: http://lessons.tradingacademy.com/article/is-buying-a-home-or-rental-property-a-good-investment-in-2013/

Looking for the right person to manage your investment property? Call  Charissa:

Charissa Frerichs

______________________________
charissa@wpmsouth.com
Office: 253.638.9811 ext. 202
Direct: 206.458.4999
Fax: 253.638.0437
www.wpmsouth.com

WPM South, LLC – The Verdi Management Group
15215 SE 272nd St Suite 204, Kent WA 98042

How do you choose the right property manager?

WRITTEN & PUBLISHED BY:  All Property Management

Choosing the right property management company from among the dozens in your area can seem like a daunting task. But with some careful planning and good interviewing techniques, you’ll be well on your way to turning the complex, time-consuming job of managing your rental property into a passive (for you) revenue stream.

Before deciding which companies to put on your short list, sit down and identify your needs and goals for the property in question. Do you need full property management services, or do you want help with only certain aspects of your business, such as leasing? Do you need a manager to live on-site? Would you prefer to work with a large company that has multiple locations and lots of resources, or would you rather work with a more boutique business, where you’ll likely receive more personal attention?

Once you’ve decided on your criteria and narrowed your search, take a close look at the following aspects of any property management companies who make your final cut:

• Company focus: While many property management companies are willing to take on a variety of property types, it’s also not uncommon for a company to have an area of particular expertise, or to heavily preference managing certain property types. It’s also not uncommon for a property management company to focus heavily on a particular skill set, such as marketing properties, providing regular inspections, or handling the administrative aspects of running an income property. When you’re evaluating a property management company, you’ll want to make sure that your interests and those of the company are aligned.
• Management systems: Regardless of how long they’ve been in business, a good property manager will be able to easily describe her proven methods for securing rental payments, performing routine maintenance, complying with regulations, handling emergencies, resolving disputes, and other critical tasks.
• Cost structure: Good property management companies will make it easy for you to understand what the total monthly cost of their services will be. When you’re reviewing the contract, make sure you understand what tasks are included in the stated monthly, hourly, or project-based fee, and look out for excessive potential additional charges.
• Availability: Like it or not, property management is a 24/7 undertaking. The company you’re looking at should have plans in place for handling any emergencies that arise outside of standard office hours.
• Customer service: Keep in mind that your property management team will not only be servicing you, they’ll be representing you when dealing with your customers, the tenants of your property. If they lack professionalism or attentiveness in this area, it will cost you money in the end. If you can, observe the company you’re interviewing in action, and be sure to get familiar with their customer service policies.

Looking for the right person to manage your property? Call  Charissa:

Charissa Frerichs
______________________________
charissa@wpmsouth.com

Office: 253.638.9811 ext. 202
Direct: 206.458.4999
Fax: 253.638.0437
www.wpmsouth.com

WPM South, LLC – The Verdi Management Group
15215 SE 272nd St Suite 204, Kent WA 98042
See article here:

http://www.allpropertymanagement.com/resources/hiring-a-property-manager/choosing-the-right-property-manager-a7.html

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