A lot of people rent places instead of buying houses or apartments, and the reasoning behind this is very simple: rent is a rather affordable monthly expense, and along with bills, is something that can be paid with a standard salary. At least, in most situations.
Of course, renting a place sometimes requires certain paperwork and procedures to make sure that you are capable of handling those expenses, but there are indeed certain places in which renting can be done with more informal procedures. It all depends!
However, what happens to those who actually rent places to people? Usually known as landlords, these are the owners of properties for rent, and landlords also have struggles and challenges to face.
In this article, we will talk about some of those challenges, what landlords can do to make sure everything goes ok, and how reliable and affordable landlord insurance can help them achieve a higher level of safety when it comes to renting.
Let’s Talk About the Problems
There are many challenges involved in the process of becoming and being a landlord, and most of them are related to three things: tenants, laws, and damages caused to your property.
Being prepared to deal with these three things is, of course, one of your responsibilities as a landlord, but how do you actually do that? Well, this aspect of renting often involves a lot of research, some level of investment, and of course, running the right background checks on people.
Of course, there are other countermeasures you can take to face these things, and we will talk about them in the next sections. First of all, let’s talk about something very important… Should you actually do it?
As a landlord “wannabe”, the first thing you should ask yourself is whether the efforts are worth it or not. Make sure to run the numbers and take notes on the expenses you are likely to deal with if you decide to rent a place, and if the profit is actually worth it considering the risks.
Most of the time, the profit is much larger than the risks, but it is more a matter of properly dealing with the situation than anything else, and the first thing you have to deal with is making sure you have insurance. If you want to truly assess your situation with efficiency, make sure to check this one article for a guide on this matter.
Property Insurance Companies
There are times in where your property will suffer damages, and although there is certainly a chance of some of the damages being caused by tenants, there’s a much higher chance that damages are caused by incidents or natural disasters. Regardless of the cause or situation at hand, you will be left wondering whether there was something you could have done better or not.
Being prepared and having emergency services at hand is definitely one of your responsibilities since a landlord definitely needs to take care of any situation as soon as possible, but insurances do have a lot of benefits in case incidents and problems were to arise.
Of course, when it comes to property insurance policies, the coverage depends entirely on the plan and company you decide to go for, but here’s a small list of coverage examples you can find:
- Coverage for fires
- For damages caused by natural disasters
- For floods
- For incidents or problems related to gas, water, and electricity
Ideally, a landlord should have at least one form of affordable insurance to make sure that the most likely scenarios are covered. Fires, damages related to pipes and electrical systems, as well as damages caused by floods, are the most likely to happen, and so landlords tend to go for these.
Dealing with Tenants
Tenants are one complicated aspect of being a landlord. Although the chances of finding good tenants instead of bad ones are much higher, one single bad tenant can completely ruin your life or make it much harder than it should be, so you definitely should approach this aspect of renting as carefully as possible.
Ideally, you should have a set of rules to follow, and one that is very common inside of the renting community is the referencing policy in which someone that you know recommends a tenant for you. This is a really good way to know the type of people you are getting, and you also have someone at hand that could be somewhat responsible for the actions of said person.
Some landlords also make sure to have a guarantee for each tenant, so in case they fail to pay, someone else’s is there to pay for them until they can recover from a bad financial situation or an emergency.
As a landlord, you should also make sure to follow your guts. At times, you might find people that just don’t click with you, and it is okay to say not to them as long as you are not heavily in need of finding new tenants. These gut feelings tend to be right, so you should make sure to pay attention to them.
Just try to not be prejudiced about people because of their race or culture, make sure to be open-minded about them and see them for who they are, and not for what they look like!
Property Management as a Landlord
Another responsibility of a landlord is to make sure that everything is working smoothly. Electricity, water pipes, paint, floor tiles, doors, and windows… Everything that involves a property should be at least decent and making sure that it is indeed decent is your problem, so dealing with it falls into your hands.
That is why a landlord should always have professional service providers at hand, in case something happens and a solution is needed as soon as possible. Most of the time, it is the landlord that ends up paying for the job, but there are occasions in which tenants are responsible for the damage so they manage it.
Performing scheduled maintenance to several areas of the property should also be done, and that is why it is recommended to assess whether renting is actually profitable or not, just because of the incredible amount of money that needs to be invested in a property for it to work smoothly.
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