How close an eye do you keep on your property manager?

[Later]

Just wondering how close an eye people keep on the deductions and disbursements made by their property manager and is it really unrealistic to expect them to get it right?

I have just come from a 2 hour meeting with my property manager to discuss strata levy payments taken from us over the last 9 months, following a self audit I had done that highlighted some serious inconsistencies. My attention was bought to the matter following 3 lots of quarterly strata levies taken over 3 consecutive months. What I discovered was the agency can not tell the difference between an invoice and a reminder notice and had been paying both costing us an additional $2400 over the period and that apparently the strata company is incorrectly recording payments made by our agent to our account.

After spending 15 hours of my own time trying to reconcile the strata companies general ledger with my rental statements I am feeling frustrated and annoyed and wondering what the hell I am paying them 8% for? Oh and not to mention it has taken 5 weeks of quering this issue with them to get to this point and I am still waiting to be reimbursed! I am now the piggy in the middle and apparently have to wait for the agency and the strata company to sort it out.

Time for a change I think.........

 

[Aaron_C]

I usually self-manage my properties so I keep a close eye on the property manager

 

[luckyone]

Yep. I find if I don't, they try to get away with charging me incorrectly for things.

 

[INVSTOR]

After self managing some properties I found it heaps more time consuming employing and paying my property manager to manage. Expenses were paid for products under warranty, even though I informed them it was under warranty. Insurance was paid twice. Overdue invoices accruing interest weren't being paid promptly. They got a rediculously high quote from someone who charges $90 if you don't go ahead with quote and he took part of my property with him. Who quotes and take stuff away with them?? I could go on all day with other stuff, but hopefully it's all behind me now. I was spending about 15 hours a week trying to sort stuff out for about 4 weeks. I've changed property managers now that my contract has expired.

 

[mech81]

I manage all my outgoings to get around this problem. Only emergency payments on the property I leave it to my PM and she's the only one I trust at present. I had another PM before this in the same agency to give him a fair go but after a year I went back to her. Back to good times now....

 

[DaveM]

From a day to day operational point of view, I dont need to watch my PM. They are very good and every month the money gets paid with the required mgmt fee and admin fee.

I arrange repairs and payment of rates/strata etc myself, they dont have to worry about it. Water rates go to the agent, they copy and invoice the tenant the usage then send it on to me for payment.

 

[MIW]

I had once been advised that I should manage my manager and that's what I usually do on a monthly basis. I check statements as I have been billed twice, or they forgot to claw back water, or they missed a payment.
Although I took the time and effort to get to know them personally (only in QLD because of larger porfolio). With others I ring from time to time (VIC, WA) so they know who I am.
I find that its like with most people, we are only human so if they get to know me better they will look after me better. It worked, each time I call they know who I am, and they do the most calls to me now. Form a relationship and that should help, that's what I found.

 

[wobbycarly]

From a day to day operational point of view, I dont need to watch my PM. They are very good and every month the money gets paid with the required mgmt fee and admin fee.

I arrange repairs and payment of rates/strata etc myself, they dont have to worry about it. Water rates go to the agent, they copy and invoice the tenant the usage then send it on to me for payment.

Same here. We pay the bills ourselves - but the PM arranges repairs.

 

[daniellee]

I had once been advised that I should manage my manager and that's what I usually do on a monthly basis. I check statements as I have been billed twice, or they forgot to claw back water, or they missed a payment.
Although I took the time and effort to get to know them personally (only in QLD because of larger porfolio). With others I ring from time to time (VIC, WA) so they know who I am.
I find that its like with most people, we are only human so if they get to know me better they will look after me better. It worked, each time I call they know who I am, and they do the most calls to me now. Form a relationship and that should help, that's what I found.

Hi,

Agree with MIW on this. Having two IPs with their respective PMs, I meet the PMs the first time to set expectations, regularly check monthly invoices for discrepencies, follow up when leases comes to an end.

Treat PMs like your reports and you are their manager. Employees need to be given performance goals and expectations and communicated regularly to ensure they are on the straight and narrow.

Regards,

Daniel

 

[laurencei]

I pay all the bills for my 5x IPs myself - but that is mainly so I can cycle it all through my CC and get lots more points.

Doesnt take long - I usually just do it once a month and let everything pile then - then do it in one big hit...

 

[Hados]

I manage all my outgoings to get around this problem. Only emergency payments on the property I leave it to my PM and she's the only one I trust at present.

I do the same thing for the one property I have through the Real Estate Agent. About to lease out another with them Friday which I'll pay outgoings on. I self manage another two which i'll roll over to the real estate agency if/when the tenants decide to leave.

By paying them myself, it helps me to keep an eye what's coming in and out and I can manage the cashflow better

 

[Scott No Mates]

Later,

like any invoice that comes to me, I spend some time to check it. Today was typical, two phones on a new plan with different carrier. Yup, not as per contract, wrong charges, wrong phone ported to wrong account, wrong phones on charges/wrong credits against phones. It took about 5 minutes to sort out, sure it was minor but still all invoices need to be checked, especially property managers as they spend very little time checking statements before they go out, and even less time approving invoices (at least our system doesn't let me process the same invoice twice, let alone 3 times).

 

[bburn]

One approach is to use software the provides transparency across all levels of the renting sphere. Several packages offer this via resident and owner portals, where the property manager can manage centrally - but there is visibility into payments, credits and expense accounting. Buildium, Intuit, and RealPage's property management software are 'cloud-based' versions that do this. Frankly, going this route takes a little time to setup, but there isn't much 'lost in the rough' going this way.