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For your consideration: Real Estate Profits And Losses. Scenario 10: What Abandonment Looks Like.

When you become a landlord, or attempt to deal with property management, you get used to turnover. It’s a part of the business. The Money Kings find, however, that not a lot of people consider complete and total abandonment of their properties by tenants. Observe the following tale:

“There once was an unassuming landlord in a far off land with many properties under his care. He woke each morning and answered phone calls, met with city officials, checked his Post Office box diligently, played with his kids and kissed his wife before he went to sleep at night. He talked with other landlords each day. He laughed as he watched his bank account soar to unexpected heights! He planned on purchasing a new boat. He had so many plans . . . The sun always shined in his land.
Then one day, a dark cloud came to the landlord’s realm. Something sinister was afoot in his world of buy, rent, sell and grow rich! The landlord hadn’t visited one of his rental properties in a far off province for many a fortnight. He decided to mount his steed and ride for the hills to catch a view of his far off “castle.” Alack! He could see in the distance, something was awry. As his faithful steed carried him closer and closer to his castle he saw” (This part of the story is true.):

Of course not. You don’t want to know what it’s like to order a 30-yard dumpster for $500.00 just to spend 8 hours to empty an abandoned house. You also don’t want to see what a unit with busted plumbing REALLY looks like. You don’t want to feel the pain in your back as you and a friend try to lift a wet couch out onto your lawn. You don’t want to smell what a cat’s litter box is like after being over turned by flooding basement waters only to recede once the city turns off water service to your house and drainage begins in your basement.

Here are the money saving tips to help you RULE a situation like this:

1. Make sure your insurance is paid up!
2. Visit your properties at least once per week.
3. If you’re renting in a neighborhood near your friends, pay them a yearly stipend to take a look at your house each week and keep in touch with that person by phone.
4. Intimidate someone in your neighborhood into watching your property by saying, “See that place over there? It’s now part of your body. What happens to it happens to you. Capiche?
5. Hire a COMPETENT property manager (We’ll get into this more at another time, because this can turn into a whole lot of trouble if you’re not careful.)
6. If you can’t visit your properties due to illness or vacation, have a relative do a drive by or call your tenants to let them know of “an emergency” in the neigborhood. Use your imagination.
7. Re-emphasize, sternly, to your tenants the damage clause of your lease and ensure them that you will prosecute any damages not paid for by them. You might be surprised at how much more they respect you.
8. Finally, visit your properties at varied times. Don’t let your tenants know you drive by at 2 AM each day. Do 2 AM one day and then 10 AM the other. Drive by unnoticed sometimes, and then simply appear on the sidewalk in front of the unit on your cell phone at other times. Make yourself known!

Good luck out there.

The Money Kings

Keywords: real estate, repair, abandonment, tenant, damage