Should You Manage Your Own Rentals?

The nice part about being a landlord/lady is the passive income stream, meaning you don’t have to be present to make money, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty of work to be done. You can do all the work, or hire a property manager if you’re willing to pay someone else to do all or part of what you don’t want to do.

So which makes the most sense for you? You should manage your own rental property if you are:

• residing reasonably close to your rental
• financially able to carry the costs of your rental while vacant
• prepared to run your rental as a real business
• able to market your rental
• able to meet potential renters to show the home and negotiate leases
• willing to do background and credit checks on potential renters
• willing to collect the rent and enforce late notices and fees
• willing to address tenants’ complaints in a timely manner
• willing to deal with problems at any hour, day or night
• handy with tools or have a good reliable handyperson on call
• unafraid to deal with and evict bad renters legally
• willing to abide by court decisions in any tenant-landlord dispute

Depending on where you live, how many properties you own, and which services you require, you can expect to pay 5 to 15 percent of your monthly rental fee to a property manager.