Complete Laundry Room To-DO List During Tenant Turnovers

The Laundry Room

The laundry room is important. Having a laundry room as opposed to keeping the washing machine and dryer (or not having a dryer) in the kitchen or garage can have a positive impact on prospective tenants. Many people either expect the laundry room to be in good condition, and will be disappointed if it is not, or they will be pleased to see the property has one. Here is a list of to-do's to encourage a new tenant to want to move in, and to encourage them to care for laundry room while they live there.

Typical Jobs

Some tasks should always be completed during tenant turnovers:

1. Inspect and clean the floor. The corners of laundry rooms often collect more fluff and bits of tissue than other rooms.
2. Clean the baseboards.
3. Check the high corners for accumulated dust and cobwebs
4. Clean the lint traps.
5. Check all door seals are in good condition, and replace if necessary.
6. Check behind the machines to see if anything was dropped by the previous tenant. Last-minute washing can be hurried; something can get accidentally dropped, forgotten, and left. 
7. Check the dryer line to the outside is in place and clamped tight. Loose pipes allow damp air and, possibly, lint not caught by the lint trap into the room.
8. Check the electric sockets, the plugs and cables are in good condition.
9. Unplug the cables and place them neatly over the machines. This adds a professional touch, a sort of staging, when a prospective tenant walks in.
10. Check the lights in case a bulb needs to be replaced.
11. Check the HVAC outlets to make sure they are clean. Look inside the duct to check nothing has fallen in. Coins and pieces of small jewelry falling out of a pocket can finish up in the ductwork.
12. Arrange any preventive or needed maintenance by a licensed and insured contractor.
13. It is unlikely, but if the previous tenant has moved the machines, replace them in such a way that it is convenient to remove clothes from the washing machine into the dryer when both doors are open. (This can be done when the maintenance work is being done or after inspecting behind the machines.)

Possible Jobs

1. Laundry rooms are for cleaning clothes, so the room, itself, should look well cared for. If the walls need to be painted or the floor covering replaced, now is the time to do it.
2. Replace (or install) a GFCI if necessary, after testing.
3. Upgrade the lighting to make the room look brighter, especially if it is also used for ironing clothes.
4. Decide if it would help to attract new tenants, and provide an ironing board, a laundry basket to hold before washing them.
5. Consider adding a sink.
6. Provide a new box of fabric softener sheets and some washing pods, so the new tenant can do an immediate wash after moving in without having to wonder where their own items are boxed.

The Takeaway

A perfect laundry room helps prospective tenants to choose your property, it implies good management, so the conscientious tenant will take it as a signal to look after the property as well. Convenient and well-maintained laundry rooms are part of the overall strategy of encouraging good tenants to renew their lease.

How to Improve Your Rental Properties Using Lighting

Small and affordable improvements to your property's lighting can have a big effect on potential tenants looking for a new home. Most people like to live in a light and bright home, they prefer a safe and welcoming home, and they want to keep their utility bills as low as possible. Changing out or adding new lighting can achieve all three. When a potential tenant is looking at and comparing several properties - all of which may be in the right place, be the right size, and in the right condition - it is often the little things that make them choose one over all the others. The greater the occupancy, the higher the annual profit. And those small but important improvements may be written off against this year's taxes.

Light and Bright

Modern LED and CFL lighting gives out more light than traditional, incandescent light bulbs. A traditional 60 watt bulb is not really bright enough to read by and gives out about 1100 lumens.  A modern LED light with only a  50 wattage rating will give out 5,500 lumens or about five times as much light. Many LED bulbs come in different designs. Modern LED lighting can look like the traditional bulbs they are replacing, old fashion bulbs to add some quaint charm to a room, and even like works of art to add that "Wow!" factor to a dining room or lounge area. They can also be flat panels to replace the fluorescent kitchen lights which go yellow over time.

So, CFL and LED lighting can look very attractive during the day, and give much better illumination at night or on a dull day. This issue has become even more important since so many kids are now home-schooled and so many adults are working from home.

Safe and Welcoming 

Movement detector lighting helps everyone to feel safer. When an outside light comes on because it detects movement it does two things; it alerts the tenant, so they can check if there is a problem. It also warns potential intruders that they cannot hide under darkness. The other benefit is that if the tenant is arriving home after dark or if they have a visitor, the light comes on as they approach the door to make it easier and safer to get home.

Lower Utilities

Yes, CFL and LED bulbs cost more to buy than incandescent bulbs, but look at the long term and see the difference:

• Useful life: Incandescent bulbs have an average useful life of 1,200 hours, a CFL 8000 hours, and a LED 25,000 hours.
• Wattage (electricity bills are charged in kilowatt hours.) A low-light incandescent bulb uses 60 watts, a CFL bulb will use 14 watts, and a LED bulb only 10 watts.
• The cost over 25,000 hours of use for an incandescent bulb (excluding replacing old bulbs with new ones) is about $180, a CFL will cost about $42, and a LED $30.

The Takeaway

You want prospective tenants to choose your property over someone else's. A home that will be brighter will feel more like a pleasant place to live. Outside lighting offers a sense of security and "homeyness." And the idea of spending less every month on the electricity bill may just be all it needs to have that lease signed today instead of waiting another month for a new tenant.

5 Reasons to Hire a Property Manager During COVID-19

The Value of a Property Manager

Many rental property landlords and investors consider a good property manager to be worth their weight in gold. This year, that opinion has become even more deeply embedded. There are two main reasons for this:

• It has been a difficult year for everyone; many worries, concerns, and frustrations get passed along to someone else. For a tenant, that is often the landlord or the property manager.
• Necessity is the mother of invention, and in challenging times good property managers develop new or improved methods that directly benefit not just themselves, but also the property owner and the tenants.

Let us look at what good property managers are doing and the 5 reasons to hire a property management company during COVID-19.

5 Reasons to Hire a Property Manager

1. They Have the Technology

With social distancing, safer-at-home and work-from-home orders in place in many states, more people are getting more used to remote communication. Automatic email response systems, direct, regular communication and follow-ups,  Zoom and facetime conversations and meetings are becoming the norm. Property management companies will have these systems in place. The tenants will "assume" they can use this technology to moan, question, respond, and report to either their landlord or property manager.  Either the landlord must bur, install, and learn to use new technology or let their property manager do it all.

2. They Have the Greater Need

A rental property investor with a few properties may be tempted to put off this kind of expenditure and hope their tenants will be different from the millions of others who expect technology support. A property manager knows they must invest both the money and the time to get, learn, and use it.

3. Good Property Managers Plan Ahead

The industry will experience the same challenges everywhere in America.  The professional associations to which property managers belong have, are, and will keep looking for ways to make everything better or to stop the everyday practical problems from becoming worse. Landlords can either wait for the problem to arise, act fast after it does, plan ahead, themselves, or leave everything to their property manager.

4. Property Managers Have Their Own Network

Professionals of all sorts network with others, receive industry news reports, practical ideas, informational blogs and so on that helps them to easily stay on the ball. These networks make it easier for the manager of a property to plan and solve than it is for a landlord working alone.

5. Property Managers Handle the Headaches

This year we have seen more overdue rents, more potential evictions, etc. than usual. Individual tenants who need help can speak to their landlord or to the manager who has more experience in helping to resolve problems or to prevent them from happening.

The Takeaway

Experience, practice, professional support, and shared ideas beat the "learn as you go" or "hopefully it won't happen" stance. It is usually good business practice to hire the experts, and this year that principle may be more relevant.

Q4 Check in Why Rental Property Investment is Still a Good Idea

Rental Property Investment

Now is a good time to seriously consider investing in rental property. What matters is for current and would-be investors to understand the current situation and the long-term possibilities. When you know the whats and the whys you can make sound decisions about why investing in rental property is still a good idea.

Let us begin with the basic principles of sound investment:

• Build your profit in on the purchase instead of waiting to make it on the sale.
• Choose your rental property location carefully, so you have a ready market.
• Choose your rental property type to meet your ready market's needs and wants.

Reasons Why Investing Now is a Good Idea

1. Many Homeowners and Rental Property Owners are Financially Overstretched and Need Rescuing.

Potential rentals will come on the market at attractive prices. Anyone who is out of work, on short time, expecting to lose their job may need to sell, despite lenders are offering support packages to help people struggling to pay their mortgage.

Some investors will have over-stretched themselves, so need to sell one or more properties in their portfolio. Others will want to use a 1031 Exchange to change their current strategy so, because of strict time limits, may need to "relinquish" a property at less than they wanted.

In any event, by buying from a "must-sell" owner builds your future profit into the purchase.

2. Some Sellers Will be Happy to Rent Back.

A homeowner who must sell (they bought a new car last year, have long-term repayment plans on new furniture, etc) may want to stay in "their home." so, they will be not only ready, willing, and able tenants, but they will care for their home, perhaps better than a new tenant. This gives you, the investor, instant income from a good and reliable tenant.

3. Work From Home (WFH) Trends Offer Opportunities

Because of COVID-19, more people are working from home. They are also trying to put some distance between them and others. This suggests a trend is beginning in renting single family homes instead of an apartment, or renting a larger property with an extra room which can be used as a home office. Savvy rental property investors get in on new trends as soon as they can to give themselves a head start over their competition.

4. Buy the Fixer-Upper

Many investors buy a property in need of renovation or repair. So, instead of buying, holding, and hoping for a good tenant, savvy investors will use this difficult time when the supply of good tenants may be low in a particular area, to renovate their new investment. When it is ready for a tenant (who will pay a higher rent to live in a recently-renovated property) many of the problems our country now faces will either be lessened or over.

5. Tax Write-Offs Are Still With Us

Lost income, repair costs, business expenses which investors may suffer now mean carry-back and carry-forward options are available. Please discuss details with your CPA.

The Takeaway

Good decisions, based on the basics of sound rental property investment mean now is still a good time to focus on rental property investment.