Rent house to retirees?

PM just told me a couple who are over 60s submitted the application. Both of them are retired. They get $1000/month from central link and $5000/month pension. They don't have other income. They don't have their own property.

What's the worst case scenario to rent house to retirees ? Is there any policy from government or VCAT to protect retirees if they stop paying rent? How is your experience with tenants who are retired ?

Any suggestion would be highly appreciated.
 
PM just told me a couple who are over 60s submitted the application. Both of them are retired. They get $1000/month from central link and $5000/month pension. They don't have other income. They don't have their own property.
So they have an income of $72K pa - sounds pretty damn good for a tenant to me :)

What's the worst case scenario to rent house to retirees ?
Same as any other tenant. They don't pay rent & / or trash the place.

Is there any policy from government or VCAT to protect retirees if they stop paying rent?
No

How is your experience with tenants who are retired ?
They are usually pretty good. They are quiet. They treat the property well. They garden, some of them. They don't have wild parties. They have a good steady income. Most of our granny flats have grannies in them - all good.
 
I differ slightly in my opinion from Prop, but this is only from personal experience with ONE tenant, not Prop's experience with many.

Our couple (late 60's) keep the house beautifully, but have an "I want and want it now" mentality. They nag, whine, whinge, sook constantly. To them we are the "landlords from hell" (our PM sent me an email which contained that exact phrase). We aren't by the way, just don't give in to ridiculous demands. Everything that is broken gets fixed and the property is well maintained. However we don't provide every one of their requests (i.e. new carpet, bigger aircon, solar lights, new clothesline when the old one was fine, etc, etc). Hence they have a very low opinion of us.

They choose not to pay their rent if something more pressing comes along. I'm sure I only hear a portion of the stories that my PM gets, but the ones I hear are quite bad - and it is always someone else's fault that they are short of money.

In short, they act like victims and blame everyone for their position.

If you haven't gathered they drive me insane!

When they can't pay and I kick-up they go to charities for the shortfall. Anglicare and the like have helped them in the past.

Anyway, I'm sure you get the idea, but Prop's experience sounds quite different, so I guess you need to treat each applicant on merit.

By the way, that is a huge amount of money they are bringing in! :eek:

Take care and good luck with it all.
 
Hi Minx,

I find that you can get tenants like yours (unfortunately :() at any age - retired or not. So it is a 'state of mind' of the tenant thing not an 'age' thing.

I'm glad you stand your ground with them though ;)
 
Hi Minx,

I find that you can get tenants like yours (unfortunately :() at any age - retired or not. So it is a 'state of mind' of the tenant thing not an 'age' thing.

I'm glad you stand your ground with them though ;)

I absolutely agree with you. The people who think everyone 'owes' them something can be of any age.

However, without knowing circumstances and (trying) not to make judgements, one wonders how a couple in their 60's could find themselves in such a position. That, of course, is none of my business, but you can see by the current behaviour how such a position could have been achieved!

Take care Propertunity. I always enjoy your posts.
 
However, without knowing circumstances and (trying) not to make judgements, one wonders how a couple in their 60's could find themselves in such a position. That, of course, is none of my business, but you can see by the current behaviour how such a position could have been achieve

I can see how this can happen. People in their sixties just didnt have the opportunities that us youngies have. Compulsory employee super wasnt around for most of their working life; people tended to stay in the one (probably poorly paid) job all their lives because security was all important to them, perhaps they had a largish family and just didnt get the deposit together. On the otherhand, maybe they did have a house and sold it and have been able to work the system to get centrelink as well as some super. And decided they would rent and let someone else organise and pay for the maintenance. While they may have the attitude that you mention, they are certainly quite well prepared financially.

As you get older you tend to put up with less crap to be honest!:D
 
We have a retired lady in one of our IP's and she's the best tenant ever.

Always pays the rent on time.
Keeps the house and garden clean
Only complains when there is a major problem.

I could use a few more of her type.

Cheers,

Bazza
 
I'm also surprsied about the amount they earn on the pension and with Centrelink. They are well paid retirees.

Anyway, in my experience, retirees can be the best tenents. They are most likely to be long term tenants, that is, they will stay for a long time. In fact, one person i have uses his small rented house from me as his base while he goes off and travels the country. He is a part time grey nomad.

But treat them well and they won't want to leave. lets face it - as a retireee, the last thing you want to be doing is moving house all the time.

One little issue that may be a concern (well 2 actually), old people tend to have little pets, ie silky terriers or cats. Just bear that in mind. Secondly, if they do stay the long term, then you may want to think about doing some modifications to your house so that it suits old folk - ie bathroom and shower, hand rails on stairs etc. Also, they may smoke too so keep that in mind.

REtirees though are good. They tend to look after the garden and the house and if you look after them well, they stay for years upon years.


Thanks


g
 
PM just told me a couple who are over 60s submitted the application. Both of them are retired. They get $1000/month from central link and $5000/month pension. They don't have other income.


I would check these figures as with a 5k pm pension there is no way they would get any money (pension) through centerlink.

Cheers
 
We have a retired lady in one of our IP's and she's the best tenant ever.

Always pays the rent on time.
Keeps the house and garden clean
Only complains when there is a major problem.

I could use a few more of her type.

Cheers,

Bazza

Ditto,

We have a retired lady whom I have not even seen or heard from for 18 months but pays rent right on time and takes extreamly good care of the place.

If only there were more Bazza.
 
If you want to verify they bring in that much income, have them submit a copy of their last payment.
Some landlords want a copy of the tenant's last paystub.Same thing.

We have a retired couple that just moved in. They had a complaint. Rob took care of it, and she gave us a bottle of homemade chow and pickled beets.
Yummy!

We have that same type of concern. There is no income we can garnish if needed.
 
I would check these figures as with a 5k pm pension there is no way they would get any money (pension) through centerlink.

It's unlikely, but not impossible. Some Centrelink benefits are not income tested (legally blind for instance). And the transitional limit for pensioner couples to receive a small part-pension is a bit over $5000 per month. They've probably purposely arranged their income streams to get a small part pension so their medication and health care is covered.
 
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I differ slightly in my opinion from Prop, but this is only from personal experience with ONE tenant, not Prop's experience with many.

Our couple (late 60's) keep the house beautifully, but have an "I want and want it now" mentality. They nag, whine, whinge, sook constantly. To them we are the "landlords from hell" (our PM sent me an email which contained that exact phrase). We aren't by the way, just don't give in to ridiculous demands. Everything that is broken gets fixed and the property is well maintained. However we don't provide every one of their requests (i.e. new carpet, bigger aircon, solar lights, new clothesline when the old one was fine, etc, etc). Hence they have a very low opinion of us.

They choose not to pay their rent if something more pressing comes along. I'm sure I only hear a portion of the stories that my PM gets, but the ones I hear are quite bad - and it is always someone else's fault that they are short of money.

In short, they act like victims and blame everyone for their position.

If you haven't gathered they drive me insane!

When they can't pay and I kick-up they go to charities for the shortfall. Anglicare and the like have helped them in the past.

Anyway, I'm sure you get the idea, but Prop's experience sounds quite different, so I guess you need to treat each applicant on merit.

By the way, that is a huge amount of money they are bringing in! :eek:

Take care and good luck with it all.

sounds like it could have been a tenant of any age to me... even the fac that they dare use welfare - imagine
 
I had an 81 yr olf apply for a place in the country I've got with a large yard. He was a keen gardener, like me, so I accepted his application. anyway, he died 2 weeks after moving in. Sad. His next of kin moved most of his stuff out, but after cleaning etc, Im about a weeks rent out of pocket now the new tenants are in.
The tenant before was an older guy, and I didnt have any problems.
 
sounds like it could have been a tenant of any age to me... even the fac that they dare use welfare - imagine

Yes I know you are right. It's a little place with a lovely garden and a garden shed and shadehouse. And don't get me wrong they do keep it well, they just aren't very nice people and yes, they could be any age from that point of view.

We thought it would be perfect for an older couple as it is small, neat and easy to keep nice.

Better luck next time perhaps.
 
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