Renee Wittenauer: What should a property owner expect from their property manager Copy

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TRANSCRIPT FROM:  Welcome to Ready Set sold with your host Bryan Vogt. Are you wanting or even thinking about selling your house but don’t know what it starts? Good thing you found Ready Set Sold and now real estate broker Bryan Vogt.

Welcome everyone to Ready Set Sold. Happy Saturday. How are you doing my goodness is a thing hold I mean cold maybe is an understatement I think iceberg city seems to be more appropriate I don’t know Antarctica or whatever you want to talk about but it definitely has been cold having said that it has been cold but quite frankly the market, especially in the Metro East Coast Allen Shiloh surrounding areas, has been hot we had a situation with a house in the market on Monday and by Monday night we had a full price offer and very happy so or and a very happy buyer so again the market is really running strong so if you’re thinking up selling your home please contact an agent someone you know like and trust and have a conversation with them with that said I want to talk about what’s going to be talked about in the program today.

We’ve got some fantastic guests I’m really excited about the first segment we talked with Renee Witnaur. She is part owner of Cecil management group and she’s gonna be talking in the first second she’s be talking about what to basically expect if you’re a tenant and you’re leaving you’re leaving a rental and the second segment she’s gonna be talking more extensively about basically the marketing so now the house may be vacant or the apartment or whatever that might be and she’s be talking more about that of what you should be expecting as a landlord or as a homeowner only the property what that said that in the third segment we’ll be talking to a charity group called r3.

I just could be a tease for that and the fourth segment we’re talking to Brian Gator of caliber home loans what should I expect from a lender and of course the tip of the week but here I am really excited to introduce Rene Whitner has been in what I would call the leasing department business for well over a decade she really knows her staff they are also a sponsor now of ready set sold which are really excited about but mainly her expertise is nothing short of amazing I’ve known her for years she just knows her stuff when it comes to leasing and that means just about anything I would start with her when you’re talking about leasing anything commercial whether it’s your home whether it’s apartments anything she just has that type of skill knowledge and that’s why we’re so happy I’m so happy that she’s on the show and she’s a sponsoring to be coming on a regular basis.

With that, Renee how you doing. Good Morning Bryan. How are you done I’m doing fantastic so Renee let’s kind of dig right into it you mentioned about what about the idea what should be expected when a person is leaving a rental Oh what should they be doing you definitely want to have communication from your property manager if your tenants are leaving the second your tenants give notice you want to be able to put putting the wheels in motion to get that property filled for you I love to have that 90 days lead time for rent the property so a good question ask your property manager is whenever a gives a tenant gives notice how far out is that going to be how quickly are they going to try to turn the information over to you and are they going to sit back and just wait for the tenant to tell them or do they have measures in place to reach out the tenant try to feel them out that 90 days to 120 days out so you can plan accordingly.

With that I see so what I’m hearing you saying is that sometimes you get the wrong rental department or the wrong leasing company unfortunately you may get what a week or two weeks’ notice and all of a sudden you’re scrambling you know I imagine that puts the person who owns is leasing it in a really bad situation for sure unfortunately I’ve heard from different clients and stuff that I been able to pick up and partner with and managing you know some of them didn’t find out that their tenants were moving until after the tenants left or yeah they didn’t find out if that a tenant was moving until one or two weeks before and not only is that not enough time to prepare financially for it but you know you want to have that marketing timeframe you want to have time for him to do maintenance city inspections and everything that comes along with it so yeah I mean you want to make sure that your property manager is being proactive and not reactive.

Whenever it comes to a tenant moving you know sometimes you do get a late notice where a tenant isn’t willing to lock in you know they don’t want to give you an answer until 30 days from their lease expiration what I encourage owners to do on that is at 60 days throw it up on the market and see what can happen because if your tenants not willing to commit to a long term lease you may have a new tenant that’s willing to commit and that’s what an owner needs is that commitment to secure the property and make sure they got that study income coming in and then it gives you know the person you know we sing it uh puts a little pressure on that’s what I’m hearing you saying this is a kind of like hey if you’re going to go let us know but if you’re going to stay then that’s that could be fine too so it could be a win-win situation exactly and it does kind of put that pressure on and let them know how serious it is.

And you know typically people that are moving normally they know 30 days out they may not want to tell you but a lot of times they know so if you just put that added little pressure on them doing what you have to do to make it work for the homeowner again so that because the homeowner doesn’t want to have a vacancy so you know you have to get that commitment you have to have those difficult conversations with the tenant letting them know why you’re doing what you’re doing and hopefully if they’re a good tenant they’ll renew off of it but if they don’t you’ve already put the wheels in motion to secure a new good tenant for it and that is so important and I love that you brought this up because just a very quick story I was talking to someone that’s been a little bit while back but the leasing company.

It wasn’t you guys of course but another leasing company basically the people didn’t know the home owners did no the people have left until they actually have happened to drive by it was a situation where they just wound up driving by and the house looks vacant and they actually called the leasing department and the least in part meant wasn’t even 100% sure and it was, to put it mildly a disaster and I think that’s what you said that’s why I mean are you talking about it’s not only the situation of financial which is you usually but it’s now getting that property filled up it will be talking a little bit more about that next segment but the importance of getting that property in there because in that situation they were literally losing you know thousands of dollars and the leasing company wasn’t even 100% sure that the people locked so and that’s a situation yeah that is there something that you guys do that sure is that I mean nothing’s perfect but those are steps that they should be looking for maybe you guys do you know one of the things that I do.

I mean you can’t just reach out to people by email or phone call and say well I tried but they’re not answering you know go buy their property I have one particular one now where the tenants not communicating with us that they’re moving out but I got a notice from utility company that they have a forwarding address for 30 days from now so we’ve probably made four or five trips by this house leaving notes on the door trying to get you know using a key to go in to find out what’s going on with this you know we’ve gone exercise of calling the emergency contact on the application so the second that there’s any inkling that somebody is going to be moving out and they haven’t given you notice you know your property manager has to do all their due diligence to try to find out what’s going on and try to find out why and it and also find out if it’s marketable because even if they’re not communicating.

But you know they’re moving you have to get in there and find out if it’s marketable that way you can get it up on the market right away and yeah I mean it you know it breaks my heart whenever I hear that homeowners have to find out by driving by that their property was vacant I mean unacceptable absolutely unacceptable because as a property manager we have different reverts in place utility companies you know you do your drive-bys you do all of your homework we should be able to know that for you you know nothing’s 100% guaranteed but that’s where we can come in and hopefully have enough respect and communication with the tenant that they’re not going to do that you know sometimes there can be an underlying reason where you know I had one recently a new management where owner didn’t know her tenants had moved out until after they were gone.

Once I finally tracked down that tennis for her they said they had been communicating with the property manager but couldn’t get a response so they just moved out so sometimes there’s more to the story than even what’s on the surface – wow that’s scary stuff I mean and I really do mean that because as you said it doesn’t mean that the buyers are I said the buyers it doesn’t mean it’s people are leasing the property aren’t trying to do the right thing so what I’m hearing is even though they’re trying to the right thing that the lending company the leasing company excuse me is not doing the right thing and it just shows fear I guess indifference and that cost people money and that’s a serious problem exactly right yeah.

I mean it all boils down to that communication you know defense communication part with it because you know as soon as you know attendance leaving we want to get in there and do walkthroughs and kind of be proactive as far as letting the owner know you know hey you can market this but you’re going to have to budget to paint or you’re going to have to budget to do new flooring or we can’t market this while the tenants in there so that’s all part of that proactive piece that way an owner can plan for this tenant turnover I love that I tailoring that time for this segment but make sure you stay tuned to the next segment we talked to Renee what an hour of Cecil Management Group and she’s me talking about what you should be doing expecting from your management company as far as marketing that house.

Your listening to Ready set Sold with your host Bryan Vogt.

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