I have found in our area of NJ, it is really hard to find suitable tenants this time of the year. I don’t know if it is because it is a shore town , but I have had a lot of duds looking at our apartments. I have shown them and not gotten much further than telling the people that I will require references directly related to rental history. That is where it has ended , thank goodness. We have had a couple of bad tenants, one of which we had to evict. Good luck to you !
This is in Southern Jersey, but not in a city and not at the shore. It’s strictly an investment property for income. It’s a very popular area (commutable to Philly) and we shouldn’t have trouble getting tenants. We considered buying a 2-3 unit house to rent to college students, but this is a lower price and should have more desirable tenants. It’s a more upscale township than the nearby University town. Once we get experience we can decide if we want to stick to condos, or move up to more difficult rentals. The easy part with the condo is that we shouldn’t have maintenance nightmares since we don’t have a roof, basement, landscaping or snow removal to worry about. The bathroom, appliances and hvac are in very good shape. It needs a good carpet cleaning and probably some fresh paint. The multi-unit homes we considered were between 50-100 years old, so much more risky. we don’t think we would lose money if we had to sell, but I guess that’s what the folks thought 10 years ago too…
I quickly read through the replies and I will go back over them for tips. I need to find a good site to do credit/background and also tips on leases.
I was thinking of asking the realtor to get us prospects, do the background and lease etc, but WE would take the time to do the showings. Perhaps they would do it for less $ if nobody had to take the time to go out there to show it? This would help us to get our feet wet as far as setting up a lease etc. When we were looking at the multi-unit houses the lady from the mgt company took us through one. She said they got 15% per month, and handled everything. We were going to stay with them for a few months if we went that route. I think the month’s rent to find a tenant might be fairly standard here in NJ.
The riskier venture is the short sale that S1 is making a bid on this week. It has potential so I hope it works out. That’s a whole different post that I might, or might not make. Main question there is…can we get the water and electric turned on for an inspection? It’s a short sale for an estate. Has been vacant for a while. If we can’t get the inspection done properly then it won’t happen. We know a pipe burst in the living room ceiling (burst due to freezing we assume in 2013) but we don’t know if the leak was fixed or if they just shut off the water and winterized it. I guess I shouldn’t start that discussion here in the thread about rentals. Someday he might rent it, but first he will live there for a while. (IF he even gets it!)
Someone I know has several rental properties. Nice homes in the Austin area. I once asked her about finding tenants. She said that the one lesson they had learned was to never, ever rent to an attorney. Having to hire a lawyer by the hour to evict another lawyer…big money for your attorney, none for you.
The attorneys we know have all been fine tenants, though of course I’m sure there are many who are obnoxious and bad tenants. I’d prefer not to have to evict anyone. In all the years we’ve had rentals, we only had a few terrible incidents with tenants. One was really bad and had complaints from other tenants and didn’t pay rent and then he died owing an entire year of back rent! The other 3 weren’t quite as bad–swore up and down they didn’t have pets but all 3 did and the pets caused significant damage, which had to be repaired. Ugh! We have since turned all rental issues over to the 7% charge property manager and he’s really a pro & does his job well!
@njfootballmom , we have two apartments and one house…two are in Ocean City. You know that our area is in trouble , because of the casino closings as well as the seasonality of our area. The two apartments are above our future store. The building is old, but solid. We renovated the apartments last winter and into spring. They were very outdated with grungy carpets, bathrooms were just awful and so were the kitchens. One of them was rented for the summer to some seasonal workers. We made good money , but annoyed some of the neighbors since they were loud and would leave trash on the deck and it blew into adjoining properties. We have to be really careful in this area because there are a lot of people who have lost their homes or been evicted from previous rentals.
I agree with you about the rental fee…this is standard in our state…even worse in NYC or Boston !
With our rental we learned asking for first and last month rent were more important than having only one month with a high deposit.
Having a significant amount to invest in the lease helps to produce a higher quality tenant.
We do offer a $50 discount for them to put an automatic draft into a bank account each month.
We aren’t in a condo so we also have the lawn and pool maintenance contracted out by us and the amount is put into the lease. Every 3 months, we have our local handyman do an inspection for needed repairs. This is noted in the lease.
Good luck. We had folks with sterling credit and references who mowed down azaleas, kicked in doors, cut pieces out of the wall to wall carpet, and asked how we got the master bathroom shower so clean, when we had to employ a razorblade to remove soap scum from the tile.
My dad had people one time who wanted to keep a little cat…turned out to be a lion. I kid you not.
I want to hire HImom’s property manager!!! How did you find one like that? Seriously, I’ve had two different realty companies/property managers and I need to find someone else. They make me nuts!
Happy reading. Lots of landlord threads and advice here.
Sorry to thread jack - I am managing the affairs of a relative who has rented out a condo and the tenant is substantially late on the rent, which I just found out (ugh). My sister and I are going there tomorrow to meet with him and present a paper insisting that he provide a certified check for $x otherwise it’s time to start looking elsewhere. I’m reading about eviction laws in my state. This guy is a flake and between us, I suspect he will be a no-show. Suggestions?
I don’t think I would meet with him. That sounds kind of dangerous. I’d send something certified mail and just start on the eviction process immediately. Though if this is the first time that he is late, I’d make sure and talk to him. Maybe the check was misplaced, maybe he forgot, there can be a number of reasons. I would be curious to hear what he says, the entire story. Does he have an excuse?
I knew this guy who would actually remove all the doors to a house/condo if people stopped paying. I doubt that is legal, but it worked. They would leave, quickly!
That’s why I’m going with my sister. His check for Dec rent bounced twice and he hadn’t paid Jan rent. I have only communicated with him through text. He appears flaky and there is always some excuse - very “the dog ate my homework.” We want to give him this one more chance and then start on eviction. My relative is being too kind-hearted but she needs the money and there is no excuse for this IMO, so my sister and I can be the tough guys.
The first time we texted - oh, he just got into a car accident. This past week -oh, I’ll meet with you, but my leg is swollen so I’m on my way to the hospital. I’m getting my blood pressure up just thinking about it :-). He also told my relative he preferred to deal with her, vs my sister and me. Well, I don’t really GAS who he prefers to deal with. Pay your bills on time and you won’t have to deal with anybody, there’s a concept!
Okay, sounds like you guys need to be the ones to lay out the law, though I don’t know why you actually have to have physical contact with him. I wouldn’t go inside the condo, in fact, I’d meet him in a public place. But I wouldn’t give him much time, I’d just start the eviction process.
I have had a couple of people in the past where I have just told them to leave, soon, and we’d call it even. That seemed to work far better than waiting six months or however long for the eviction process to start. Sounds like he’s quite comfortable taking advantage of your relative.
Good points. I do want to check out the condo to make sure he’s keeping it up.
This guy never responds to phone calls. Ever. I can be texting him and call him and he won’t pick up. He claims repeatedly not to get emails I repeatedly send. I don’t think he’s dangerous, I just think he’s a flake, and my relative isn’t on the ball either so it’s what’s politely called a cluster 
People can really let themselves be taken advantage of. My grandparents had a family renting their house who hadn’t paid in years, and they just let it happen. My husband starts texting people if they’re just one day late, and texting seems to be the preferred method of contact for our tenants, fortunately.
Might be good to get a track record of certified mail…whatever the kind is that requires a signature.
And with notice, the owners of any place are allowed access, aren’t they?
I hate deadbeats. One reason I would never make it long term as a landlord.
We had an awful prior property manager. Found the current one by referral from someone who was happy with theirs. I agree that you need to find out eviction requirements and be sure to do it right.
The one time we had to get rid of a tenant who lost his job, we just told them to leave at the end of the month and not have to pay for one month’s rent. I didn’t want to have to evict them and didn’t want them to damage the property. It seemed to be the decent thing to do, so they had more money for their move to the W’s mom’s home.
It worked pretty well for us and they said they’d pay us back. We told them to just pay it forward. They never repaid us, but we do hope they paid it forward.
In our state, I believe the sheriff needs to formally serve a notice of eviction before proceedings can begin. The tenant still can trash and wreck the place, which is why we just wanted to give an incentive for them to get out of the unit ASAP, even if we lost some rent.
One of the best things out property manager does is that he gives the option of paying for maintenance/repairs up front or out of rental and not having to take out a loan. He doesn’t charge a finance charge when we opt to take the funds from rental income.
He was able to repair a unit that others said was uninhabitable so it can be rented out for a modest amount. He gets along with the tenants and they are happy he is responsive to their needs.
Also, since he manages a lot of properties, when they have a repairs for an appliance, the repair people respond promptly and provide very reasonable rates. They also know a lot of handymen, who do repairs as needed.