What Qualities To See In Property Manager Before Hiring? The idea of hiring the right property manager is one that sounds tempting. This is because of the roles such professionals can perform when hired. These could be helping to ensure your property is well secured and maintained over a given period of time. A property manager also ensures prospective buyers and tenants have access to a property. Finally, they can prepare financial reports about your property.
Table of Contents
List of Qualities
Here is the challenge
All of the benefits highlighted above about property managers can only be experienced once you hire a professional. Are you planning to hire a property manager? Do you know that most of the property managers aren’t good enough to handle your property? There is no need to bother again. This is because the major aim of this post is to list out some of the qualities to look out for in a property manager before hiring him/her.
Also, Read: What are the Job Responsibilities of Property Managers?
Experience is crucial
You need to look out for a property manager that is vastly experienced in this field. Property management is all about getting your most valuable asset (property) entrusted in the hands of someone else. There are lots of aspects to consider when trying to look at the experience a property manager has. For instance, you will have to look at how they have managed to handle tenant problems over the years, maintained the same property like yours, updated with recent landlord-tenant laws, generated returns for their clients in the past, and others.
Accounting and financial acumen
This is one aspect you have to also consider in order to ensure you are getting nothing short of the best property manager out there. Most property managers are great when it comes to managing the physical state of your property. However, they usually fall short in the aspect of financial management.
Professional real estate companies seem to be creating different departments which handle financial matters of the property they have been entrusted with. A property manager with very sound knowledge of financial management will help you save costs in the long run.
Also, Read: When a Landlord should hire a Property Manager or PMC?
Communication skills
Property management entails communicating with different categories of persons. Your property manager will not only be dealing with your tenants. In addition to this, he will be communicating with local agencies, regulatory bodies, and others. It is important your manager knows how complaints can be managed properly. The best way of evaluating the communication or people skills of a property manager is by having a one–on–one chat with him.
Organizational skills
The truth about property management is that it can be very demanding when it comes to being organized and coordinated. This is probably why you have decided to hire the services of a property manager in order to ensure you don’t have to rack your brains about how some things will be executed with regards to such property.
A good property manager takes the details of everything. Try to find out how they intend to manage your property once it has been entrusted to them. Organizational skills can be very important. Ignoring this aspect can bring about tenants that are unsatisfied, damage of property, and fines. It is all about ensuring you a well – represented by your manager.
Patience is vital
The process of property management is very stressful. This could be dealing with tenant issues, maintaining the property on regular basis, carrying out the financial management, and attending to prospective buyers and tenants. This is why you need to find out whether such a manager has got the required patience to carry out all of these roles without any complaints.
The best way to know is to check whether such a property manager is a very good listener. Be on the lookout for someone that can handle problems/complaints with great patience.
Investor mindset
If you ever hire a property manager that isn’t good enough, the value of your property may start to depreciate with the passage of time. Your property manager should understand the basics of taking care of such property. Also, he should understand some basic terms in the real estate field like net present value, internal rate of return, and others.
Marketing in-built
A property manager is a godsend for landlords because they take care of the day-to-day management of a property. If you’re a property owner, it’s important to find a property manager you can trust to take care of the property while you’re not around. Branding is a key factor to consider while looking for a property manager because a great property manager will be as much of an asset as a good property. The first thing you want to do is research the property manager’s marketing quality. For example, using 3D apartment floor plans for the rental listing is important. They will be the face of the business, and if their marketing is poor then they will not be able to grow the brand, which will lead to a decrease in your property values.
A quality property management company is one that is capable of providing a cohesive marketing strategy for the company. This could be in the form of a website, print ads, or better billboard placement in high-traffic areas. Prospective tenants will seek out a company with a good marketing strategy because it tells them the company is pro-active and well-informed. It is important to make sure a company has a solid marketing strategy in place before you make a final hiring decision.
One of the challenges that estate property owners can face is not understanding how to allocate resources and to allocate them in the best possible way. Hiring a quality property manager is the best way to mitigate risk and to ensure that you can free up your time to focus on what you do best. It’s important to find one that has marketing, advertising, and branding qualities. They should be someone who will be able to engage with your customers and also be able to help you in getting rid of any potential issues that may arise in the future.
Also, Read: What are the Benefits of Using a Property Management Company?
Customer service at the heart
One of the most important qualities in a property manager is good customer service. The property manager is the person the tenants end up interacting with most. If they’re not polite, organized, or responsive, the tenants will be constantly frustrated and it will reflect poorly on the landlord. Another important quality is management experience and works ethic. A landlord needs to make sure they pick a property manager with the highest level of integrity and honesty. They need to be honest and hardworking. All of these qualities make a good property manager.
You made an excellent point about hiring a property manager that knows how to communicate with your tenants when they need something. I saw ads that offer these services to new condo owners lately. I will look into this if I decide to try dipping into the rental apartment business someday.