Pre-Screening Your Property Manager

What kind of references can your property manager give you? Do they have a list of referrals and recommendations that they can present to you upon request? Property management is a customer service business towards both landlords and residents and your prospect should have a lot of happy customers on both sides. Due Diligence on Your Manager A property manager should absolutely be able to give you a list of at least 3 or 4 tenants that would have nice […]

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Why I Love Millennials as a Rental Market Class

Millennials between the age of 18 and 33 get a bum wrap in today’s society as being self-entitled brats who think the world owes them something. Well, hold the phone, I have to step up to the plate on their behalf and let you know why I think our society may be in pretty good hands with our future generation driving the bus down the road. To set the record straight here. Let’s face it. I am not a Millennial, in fact I’m far […]

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Business Lessons from a Chicken applied to Property Management

I am a landlord and property manager. I fill my day with, resident screening, renovations, repairs, maintenance calls, lease-ups and make-ready for apartments. I love what I do and I’d like to think I’m pretty good at it. Recently, I was taught a valuable lesson about my business while going out to take a lunch break. In my rental market there are all types of restaurants, fast food stops, Chinese buffets, and places to grab a hearty lunch on the […]

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Talking Teaches, Listeners Learn: Business Tips for Landlords

Asking the right questions to build trust and rapport helps in closing the sale. No man is an island and no successful businessperson ever made it big without the help of others. There are so many people needed to build a successful business today. We need business advisors, mentors, coaches, lawyers, accountants, managers, assistants and a whole hosts of other specialty skill sets to make the wheels of progress turn. That is just on the business side of making operations […]

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The “Landlord” Lone Ranger

Know your State Sanitary Code, Building Code and Tenant/Landlord Laws in your local market. I see it happen all of the time in our local Northern Worcester County Landlord Association. I call them Lone Rangers. Some would-be-hopefully-landlord reads a book or attends a weekend seminar. They have stars in their eyes with visions of grandeur. The see the big picture as a full-color dream laid out before them of riches and fortune because they are going to buy their first property […]

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No More Fueling Around with Bad Renters

The Setting The following story is true. This story has a background to it that is critical to the events as they unfolded on that cold March night. In 2006 Massachusetts passed legislation to make CO detectors mandatory in ALL residential buildings. The law was named after Nicole Garofalo, a young 7-year old girl who had died from CO poisoning. It happened when the snow piled up so high in the back yard that it blocked the ventilation from the basement […]

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Tips for Apartment Renters on Getting Your Dream Apartment

Like most potential residents looking for an apartment, by now you’ve probably called a lot of different landlords and you may be frustrated with the lack of communication between you and the landlord when trying to find out about the apartment. Landlords also have been speaking to a number of people about the apartments they have to rent over and over again. Sometimes, the landlord too becomes frustrated with people who call looking for an apartment who aren’t prepared at all to have the conversation. Lots of landlords I know, […]

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