Hi all,
Though I would relate recent happenings in my small world. I have been letting out a large house in Brisbane for the last 2 years through a PM who was part of the agency I purchased the property through. At the beginning of Feb I received a handwritten note on the bottom of the monthly rental statement saying my tenants were intending to move out soon. They had a fixed term lease until 22/05/2012 so I gave her a call and found that she had previously told the tenants they could vacate early with 2 weeks written notice, that they had given this notice by email, which she had missed, so they had just handed the keys in....
(It gets worse)
I asked her to re advertise immediately which she did using the sale photographs prior to my renovation 2 years ago(yep lime green walls and orange carpet) and bumped up the rent some $65/week. I didnt find out until later that the rental increase of this much absolved the previous tenants of continuation of rent payment until a new tenant was found, discussed in this thread:
http://somersoft.com/forums/showthread.php?t=77023&page=2
I also found on the last rental statement that she had paid a plumber to fix the same laundry taps twice in consecutive weeks costing me around $185 each time and taking the money from the rent.
This is the point I contacted Russell Peter from Pure Rentals after recommendations on this forum. Russell contacted the old PM, got professional photographs done and re-advertised properly.
(It still gets worse)
Russell had organised an open house the first week to gauge interest, I get a phonecall from Russell (who was showing a couple through) to tell me someone had broken a vent in the surfeit at the back of the house, poked a garden hose into the roof space and turned the tap on (for more than a day by the look of the damage to one of the bedrooms). The prosepective tenants understandably headed for the hills. I left work in a daze, rang insurance, police, and raced down there. All this just after my wife lost her job so I wasnt in the best state of mind.
Luckily I was covered for malicious damage except the carpets (although the builders put a large industrial de-humidifier in immediately which seems to have saved the carpets anyway). If I can figure out how I will post photo's of the damage.
(It now gets better)
I got a phonecall from Russell today who has found a new tenant at the $65/week increase. I am not sharing for any pity vote (although a testing time it has been), I have just been to Roma post flood and the devastation out there put things in perspective. It is more about sharing some of the pitfalls and giving a decent PM a bit of a wrap. So far Russell has:
Organised the transfer of management from a somewhat "cool" ex PM, secured the hoses etc to stop a re occurance, organised a company to save the carpet, conducted multiple open houses, given great advice about a future rental strategy, answered calls from insurance assessors etc who are wanting access, taken multiple calls from me up to 8pm in various states of coherancy, and taken a call from prospective tenants who had placed an application with the old PM 3 weeks ago and had not heard back....
All in all a total of I guess 10 - 12 visits to my property for the same flat fee (although he has not yet received a cent). Thumbs up mate
My mistake was not monitoring the old PM closely enough picking up the increasingly sloppy service, this has cost me somewhere in the region of $5000 a figure minimised only by Russell's hard work post event.
Oh and the wife has a new job at twice the money
Though I would relate recent happenings in my small world. I have been letting out a large house in Brisbane for the last 2 years through a PM who was part of the agency I purchased the property through. At the beginning of Feb I received a handwritten note on the bottom of the monthly rental statement saying my tenants were intending to move out soon. They had a fixed term lease until 22/05/2012 so I gave her a call and found that she had previously told the tenants they could vacate early with 2 weeks written notice, that they had given this notice by email, which she had missed, so they had just handed the keys in....
(It gets worse)
I asked her to re advertise immediately which she did using the sale photographs prior to my renovation 2 years ago(yep lime green walls and orange carpet) and bumped up the rent some $65/week. I didnt find out until later that the rental increase of this much absolved the previous tenants of continuation of rent payment until a new tenant was found, discussed in this thread:
http://somersoft.com/forums/showthread.php?t=77023&page=2
I also found on the last rental statement that she had paid a plumber to fix the same laundry taps twice in consecutive weeks costing me around $185 each time and taking the money from the rent.
This is the point I contacted Russell Peter from Pure Rentals after recommendations on this forum. Russell contacted the old PM, got professional photographs done and re-advertised properly.
(It still gets worse)
Russell had organised an open house the first week to gauge interest, I get a phonecall from Russell (who was showing a couple through) to tell me someone had broken a vent in the surfeit at the back of the house, poked a garden hose into the roof space and turned the tap on (for more than a day by the look of the damage to one of the bedrooms). The prosepective tenants understandably headed for the hills. I left work in a daze, rang insurance, police, and raced down there. All this just after my wife lost her job so I wasnt in the best state of mind.
Luckily I was covered for malicious damage except the carpets (although the builders put a large industrial de-humidifier in immediately which seems to have saved the carpets anyway). If I can figure out how I will post photo's of the damage.
(It now gets better)
I got a phonecall from Russell today who has found a new tenant at the $65/week increase. I am not sharing for any pity vote (although a testing time it has been), I have just been to Roma post flood and the devastation out there put things in perspective. It is more about sharing some of the pitfalls and giving a decent PM a bit of a wrap. So far Russell has:
Organised the transfer of management from a somewhat "cool" ex PM, secured the hoses etc to stop a re occurance, organised a company to save the carpet, conducted multiple open houses, given great advice about a future rental strategy, answered calls from insurance assessors etc who are wanting access, taken multiple calls from me up to 8pm in various states of coherancy, and taken a call from prospective tenants who had placed an application with the old PM 3 weeks ago and had not heard back....
All in all a total of I guess 10 - 12 visits to my property for the same flat fee (although he has not yet received a cent). Thumbs up mate
My mistake was not monitoring the old PM closely enough picking up the increasingly sloppy service, this has cost me somewhere in the region of $5000 a figure minimised only by Russell's hard work post event.
Oh and the wife has a new job at twice the money
