Vacant IP’s

Hi Grant and and Nic

I can’t help with the Kalgoorlie/Boulder area as it’s not where I’m investing, but I have the same problem with a property sitting vacant for a much longer period of time than I had anticipated. We own three properties in the south island of NZ, two were bought with sitting tenants, medium to long term and with an excellent rental history of looking after the places, paying on time etc. the third house we bought was vacant but run down with heaps of potential. We have spent what we expected on repainting inside, completely recarpeting, converting a storage area into a 4th bedroom and a tidy up of the garden. Agent assured us it would now rent. It didn’t. We are into our 4th month with no tenant. Then the agent rings and says the guy who had done the lawns and gardening was interested in renting it (because of its good outdoor storage) and would we accept $125 a week (we had been asking $140 but were prepared to drop to $130 which still would have made it+ve). We negotiated what we thought was a win-win, ie we would accept $125 if he would maintain the lawns and gardens at a particular standard. Yep said the agent no worries, he’ll sign the papers this week. A week ticked by, nothing. Kept making phone calls and sending emails, getting the run around. Agent finally said don’t think he’s going to pay $125, would we take less. Thinking I was probably committing commercial suicide, I said no. I don’t like being messed around. Meanwhile, went back to my trusty handyman/builder/painter and got a quote for repainting entire outside of house. Organised for that to start this week, painter rings me and says one of his subcontractors loves the property, could they move in next week, happy to pay $140, they’re going to install a skylight to bring some more light into the house and the painter has also lopped a large tree which was making parts of the house quite dark. (no charge to us, he appreciates the fact that I put a lot of work his way and ALWAYS pay his bills immediately)

So finally we have a signed up tenant with great references who is already doing maintenance work on the place. I guess the point to this long winded story is that it pays to nurture great relationships with tradespeople, you never know how the relationship will benefit you. And keep plugging away at property managers (I have found them a difficult lot in NZ, always pleasant but not very proactive. Because I found my own tenant I will not pay their normal fee to place a person in the property.

Keep on top of the maintenance, be prepared to drop your rent slightly, at least in the short term. I work on the theory any rent is better than no rent. Good luck and let us know how you go.

Cheers
Jane

Hi Grant and Nic,

Firstly my suggestion would be to get rid of the PM!! [angry2]

I had a similar problem with a QLD property, agent was nice enough but what I learnt later is that she was previously the recepionist and got a promotion to PM! So basically I was telling her how to market my property, after asking questions to her on how many open days had they had to show people through etc.. I found out she knew Jack s— about managing property in general.

Before I got rid of her I rang another 2 agencies and gave them a grilling…I mean an interview on how they would market my property. I chose one of them and within a week they had found a suitable tenant.

Get the agent to give you a market appraisal on rent for your property. I was promised the world when signing up with the agency and was told I would get $200 when the reason it was not renting was it was over priced and I ended up getting $175.
So don’t be bothered about waiting for your current agent to find you a tenant take action as she is costing you lots $’s by not having anyone in renting your place.

Good luck[thumbsup2]

Jenny1

Wow Kiwi, I’d be worried the agent would twig to what I was doing, maybe I’d get a friend to be the “tenant” and then I’d ring looking for a PM. Not a bad idea. And if the agent is the problem, what do you do when all the local agents are the same?? There are only 3 in the town we are in in NZ and they haven’t actually been promoted from reception, they still ARE the receptionist, just had PM hat added to their name. Like I said, you can’t fault the friendliness but I find myself giving them the list of questions to ask tenants (her response was “that’s a good idea, I hadn’t thought of doing that”) And for this I pay a 10% fee! But I can’t manage the properties myself from here so don’t have a lot of choice at the moment. There has to be an opening for someone really good at this over there.

Anyway Grant and Nic, hope things work out for you soon. Are you close enough to do any marketing yourselves?

Jane

I have heard from several persons that the PMs in Kalgoorlie are really hopeless. I’m looking for one as well. Any suggestions/recommendations?
livelife