Renting your house

[everam01]

Any good resources on preparing your house for rent or steps to take? Do you get it in show condition? How far in advance do you try to show it? We would probably have to get a realty company involved since we would be moving out of state.

[krystee]

I found some good books at the library and also found a good property management company. There are some BAD ones out there. I think I called eight different ones before I got a single call back. Two of them eventually called me weeks later and the rest never responded at all. We are going to have our place in almost show condition (we're cleaning the carpets and freshening the paint after we move out, so that won't be done while it's being looked at). Our property manager told us to list it two months before we want to move, but your market might be different.

[ejpint]

We had ours in show condition because we tried to sell, first. So staged, professionally cleaned, etc. I wish we had gone with a rental company right away, we tried to rent it ourselves for a couple of months. Ours is now with a property management firm, and they do all the showings, helped set the price, etc. FWIW, we've had ours on the rental market since August, and no renters yet. We've had three serious applicants, and all have fallen through. I'd give it a couple of months unless you're in a hot rental market.

[lynn07]

Nov 14, 2012 16:18:43 GMT -5 ejpint said:

We had ours in show condition because we tried to sell, first. So staged, professionally cleaned, etc. Ours is now with a property management firm, and they do all the showings, helped set the price, etc. .

This was us, too. Tried to sell first, then went the rental route. We started using a property management company right away. They did the background checks on applicants, showings, etc. We found a great tenant within 2 weeks of putting it on the rental market (but Denver and its suburbs are a pretty good market, so that may not be common). After a year, we were comfortable enough doing it ourselves (and our great tenant wanted to stay), so we no longer use pm anymore. So far, it's been a good experience.

[Deleted]

We also tried to sell first so our house was staged. It took 3 months to rent but it was a 4br/2bath. The PM company said smaller houses with cheaper rent take less time.

[jenny1223]

I'd definitely recommend hiring a property management company. I don't own any rental properties, but I do work with property management companies nationwide. Let me know if I can provide any info that might help!

[jewel]

If you're moving more than a couple hours away, I would definitely hire a property management company ASAP. You'll also want to become familiar with state Landlord/Tenant laws. Browse through Craigslist, the newspaper, and other listing websites for the going rent in your neighborhood. The PM company should help with all of the other details (payment, repairs, etc).

We have 2 rental properties and I manage both. I list and show them as soon as I know there will be a vacancy, and just advertise the date available. I get the most interest when listing 30 - 45 days out. When I initially listed each place, we were living in them and they were in perfect condition. Since then, I've only shown them with renters living there. They are usually in decent condition.

Good luck! For us, it has been really easy and worked out well (knock on wood....) but it is a risky situation and I know others have had a much more difficult time.

[preppy]

We just had renters move into our home last week. We had it professionally cleaned and in show condition and we used a realtor to screen renters and show it. The rental company has handed it off to us and now we are managing the property on our own. We has it listed for 3 weeks before we found a good applicant. Having someone else take care of the showings and screenings for the renters worked great for our busy schedule.