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“Section 8 Housing” is the phrase often used to refer to the Housing Choice Voucher Program, a federal program enacted to help low-income families better integrate into the public housing market. We’ve found that many landlords are hesitant to dive into the world of low-income housing, wary of coming across difficulties with tenants and government bureaucracy. However, in our experience with property management in the Salt Lake area, Section 8 Housing is almost always a great experience for landlords. Below are 4 reasons that you should consider the Housing Choice Voucher Program a little more seriously. (more…)

No one wants to be that annoying renter or neighbor. You don’t want to be a nuisance, and often, when you are that tenant, it’s unbeknownst to you. It’s rarely intentional, and so it’s easy to not notice that you’re being annoying, bothersome, or inefficient. Especially if you’re a first time renter, you may be unaware of some of the etiquette of a renting a property from someone. A tenant is usually only concerned with their rights as a renter, and for good reason. But being a great tenant means that you won’t have issues when you have maintenance requests, when it comes time to renew your lease, or unwanted surprise visits. Here are our top tips to be a great tenant!

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When you live in a rental unit, it can be hard to make the space feel like your own. You want to feel comfortable, and make it feel like home. But you also don’t want to sacrifice your deposit by painting the walls or drilling a bunch of holes into the walls. You also don’t want to spend tons of money decorating an apartment, just to not be able to keep any of the fruits of your labor when you move out(and be billed to return it back to the way it was before on top of that). Here are a few of our favorite rent-friendly ways to decorate your rental apartment!

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Over 50% of potential tenants that want to move into your rental property, will have a pet. This means that if you don’t allow tenants who own pets to rent from you, you’re shutting out the majority of your potential tenant opportunities. If you’ve had a hard time filling vacancies, or are unhappy with the amount of rental applications you’ve been receiving, it may be time to rethink your “no pet” policy.

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The majority of your future clientele consists of millenials. There are changes and trends that come with every new generation, and as you clientele begins to change as the generations get older, you need to learn and develop new skills and tactics to market your properties more efficiently.

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Although one of the most enjoyable seasons of the entire year, the holiday season also tends to be one of the busiest seasons of the entire year, as well. It’s easy to get so busy with everything else that you have going on, that managing your property is the last thing on your mind. With how busy and stressed out you may end up being for the remainder of the year, here are a few property management tips to help your holidays go a bit smoother.

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No one wants a bad tenant. They can be hard to detect, though. When renting your property, you want the entire process to be smooth. In an ideal world, the perfect candidate would come to your door the exact moment you have a vacancy, and would want to stick around forever. Unfortunately, that’s not always what happens. Sometimes you have vacancies for much longer than you intend, tenants that leave earlier than anticipated, and horrible tenants that you really wish would leave sooner.

Financial history

A bad tenant will often try to trick you during an application process. Obviously, they want something that you have, the property. They’ll turn on the charm and go to certain extremes to make it seem like their credit and history is a lot better than it actually is. An owner rented property is a lot more likely to be targeted by this sort of bad tenant. The owner of a property is a lot less likely to notice the red flags in a financial history. A property manager has been trained to find these issues and red flags, and can often keep you out of the nightmare experience altogether.

Tenant screening

Before choosing someone to live in your property, you’ll want to do tenant screening. You need to make sure that they’re a trustworthy person who will pay their rent on time, and not break your rules. A bad tenant could leave you with months of unpaid rent, and costly damages that need repaired. To ensure that your property is only being rented to the best possible potential tenants, there are a few things during the tenant screening process that should be done:

Former landlords should be contacted to learn whether or not they paid their rent on time and if they were good tenants. You should often contact more than one, to ensure that they have a good history.

Both income and employment verification should be collected.

Run a credit report.

Contact their personal references.

Do a public notice search, to make sure there have never been evictions, bankruptcy, etc.

If your tenant seems to be serious about their job or schooling, they’re more likely to be a good tenant. If they have less to lose(money, school, job, family, friends, pride, reputation) the less you can expect from them as a tenant. If they tend to move around often without reason, this is another red flag that they might not be a very reliable tenant.

Technology has completely changed our world. A few decades ago, the idea that you’d pay your rent or contact your friends electronically was bizarre. Yet here we are, doing almost everything that we do over the internet or from our phones. From paying bills, scheduling doctors appointments, and searching for recipes for dinner. This is all a good thing, though. Technology has simplified our lives. When someone is looking for a new place to live, it would make sense that they would turn to technology to do this. (more…)

No one likes finding new tenants for their property, but it’s often necessary. If you find a tenant that you love, it can be hard to come to terms with letting them go and having to find someone else to fill their spot. As your tenants move out, the issue rises of not only finding a new tenant to live in the vacant property, but also making sure that your property is ready to move in quickly. (more…)

We’ve all been there. No matter how careful you are, you’re bound to break or damage something while renting a property. Whether you live in an apartment complex, or you rent out a home, it can be a nightmare become reality when you break something. The most important thing is to not stress out too much or let yourself make it out to be a bigger problem than it is. (more…)