Posted on 07/04/2022 3:34 PM | by NaijaHouses
Most people buy rental property to generate passive income. They like the idea of taking in a steady flow of rental income without having to do much.
But the more rental properties you own, the more it takes to manage them all. And before you know it, being a landlord could become a full-time job.
So if you want to keep your rental business from taking over your life, you need to think about outsourcing routine tasks. And one of the easiest ways to do this is to hire a property manager
A property manager will handle all the day-to-day work for you—marketing, tenant screening, maintenance requests, evictions, and more!
Of course, any property manager will charge for their services. Usually, it’s anywhere from 8% to 12% of the rent per unit that they manage. Still, the cost of hiring a property manager is well worth it (and may even help maximize your rental returns) when you consider all the benefits.
So here are the top 5 benefits of hiring a property manager you should know:
First of all, a good property manager will have other clients, so they’ll already have connections with contractors and vendors. This means you don’t need to search for the best plumber or electrician in town. With a property manager, you have one go-to person to handle it all, saving you lots of time and money in the long run.
On top of that, property managers already have systems in place for routine processes. For example, they might use special rental collection software that sends tenants automated reminders and late fee notices. Or they might have an established evictions process. So by hiring a property manager, you can leverage their efficient and time-tested systems.
A good property manager will also have extensive knowledge of the local real estate market. They can help you set competitive rent prices, write compelling home listing ads, host successful open houses, and ultimately keep your vacancy rates low so you can maximize your returns.
After all, property managers are highly motivated to limit tenant vacancies because it affects their pay, too. If you’re not generating any income, they aren’t either. You need to be making rent for them to take a cut.
As a landlord, you must follow several local and federal housing laws. For example, there are ferderal housing law against tenant discrimination, local zoning regulations, and rules about landlord-tenant relations like eviction laws. Violating any of these could result in steep fines and expensive lawsuits.
A property manager will be familiar with all relevant rental laws so that you can avoid any legal costs. And if you do incur any legal fees, most property managers handle the expense for you.
Hiring a property manager also comes with tax benefits. Since the IRS considers owning rental property to be a type of business, you can deduct any property management fees from your taxes. So by hiring out the work to a property manager, you can leverage the tax code, whereas if you did the work on your own, you wouldn’t get any tax benefit on your time.
Lastly, hiring a property manager gives you peace of mind. They take care of all the emergency phone calls, maintenance requests, interactions with difficult tenants, and more. They can even screen out rental applicants with red flags to help you avoid bad tenants in the first place.
Delegating all these responsibilities to a property manager leaves you with fewer headaches, less stress, and more freedom to do what you want. You won’t have to be on call 24/7 or be tied down to your property’s location, which means you can travel, work on other business ventures, or just relax.
Wrapping It Up
When you’re first starting out as a landlord, managing your own rental property might be the way to go—especially if you have some handyman skills and you like interacting with people. But if you want to scale your rental business, you need to seriously consider hiring a property manager. At some point, you can’t handle all the management duties on your own.
And even though hiring a property manager may eat at your profit margins initially, they’ll help you reduce so many operating costs from legal fees, taxes, vacancies, and more, that they’ll be well worth the cost in the long run.
Source:Informationng