Hi all,
We are not happy with our Pms (property managers) and intend to manage the property ourselves.
The current lease finishes in january. We live overseas, but have a property in Adelaide. I intend to call the tenants, and enquire whether they intend to extend the lease. I will then notify the PM that I would like to cancel the contract (3 months notice).
I will be in Adelaide early october and will arrange all the bills to be directly debited to my account. I will also give the tenants a contact number of a friend in Adelaide who can attend to maintenance if required.
The property is only 8 years old, and would not require much, if any, maintenance. It is also fetching $370 a week rent, and thus hopefully is in the higher end of the market and will therefore maintain decent tenants.
Do I need to obtain anything from the Pms? If the current tenants do vacate, I am tempted to keep the Pms on until january if the tenants do vacate as I am aware charges are higher to find a tenant without a management contract. The current Pms charge 3 weeks rent to find a tenant, if there is a management agreement it will be 1.5 weeks.
Any advice regarding this process would be very much appreciated.
Thanks
Your agent charges 3 weeks rent to find a new tenant? That seems ridiculously high to me!! We have 3 IP's in Queensland and we pay one week's rent plus GST each time a new tenant signs – or $25 plus GST "re-sign fee" if the same tenant re-signs for another fixed period. I have never heard of such high management fees before??
There are certain legal obligations you have as a landlord so I would be wary about trying to manage it yourself when you live overseas – for example, in NSW under the Residential Tenancies Act, you must give your tenants a copy of the 'Renting Guide' at the beginning of the tenancy agreement. If not, you can be found to be in breach of the lease agreement.
If this tenant re-signs and you ditch the PM, then in 12 months moves out, you'll have to source and screen a new tenant from overseas, organise the relevant paperwork, lodge the bond, do a condition report when the old tenant moves out and the new tenant moves in, provide copies of necessary forms and paperwork to the tenant… and who will do your regular property inspections every six months? It's a lot of work to do and a lot of responsibility placed on your friend.
I have a professional property manager looking after all of my properties and they're brilliant. When our unit had a bathroom leak, the PM arranged 2 quotes (co-ordinating with the tenant to let the contractors into the property), then once I approved a quote, arranged the repair, took photos of before and after and sent them to me for approval before I had to pay. It would have been such a hassle to organise by myself as I live in Sydney and my property is in QLD. There are legal timeframes within which she could contact the tenant and arrange inspections, etc, so it was great that I didn't have to worry about any of that.
Why don't you look for a PM that charges more reasonable management fees? If you're keen to DIY – I think the only things you'll need from the PM are a copy of the lease and the condition report on entry, plus any inspection reports from throughout the tenancy, but you should have been provided with this already.
Good luck with it all!
Hi,
Thanks a lot for your informative response. I will enquire at a few agencies to compare rates, it seems the best bet.
I don't think I'd ever attempt to find my own tenant, I'd always outsourse to an agent. Its just the management of the property that I would be happy to do. This is because the property is fairly new, and nothing, as yet, has needed to be fixed. The only expenses so far are council, water etc.
Thanks for your help
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