127 of 127 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Beginners Guide to Rental Management, October 6, 2004
This review is from: Managing Rental Properties for Maximum Profit, Revised 3rd Edition: Save Time and Money with Greg Perry's Foolproof System for: *Buying the right ... tenants *Getting paid on time *Fixing and (Hardcover)
This book is good for those who have very limited experience in managing rental properties. It's main focus seemed to be on managing time and for those of you who don't know the secret I will let you in on it. Excellent Tenants = Minimal Time. It's finding and keeping the excellent tenants that require some time. This book goes into detail about how to do just that. If you are a struggling landlord or a complete newbie than this book is for you.
However, if you have some experience in this area, or are an effective manager outside of rental properties you will probably be an effective rental manager. Other things to consider is that Mr. Perry seems to specialize in very low cost rentals so much of his ideas are drawn towards those crowds. For Example
Getting Tenants the book says advertising the local newspaper is the best, it does work but for higher cost rentals I average about 70% of new tenants from the internet.
Dishwashers and Garbage Dispoals - you might be able to get away without them in cheap units, but try renting a unit at 1500 a month without them - it just wouldn't work.
Wainscot - Again nice idea for those low income units, but most people look at wainscot as that cheap stuff you had on your vacation home when you grew up.
Electric Water Heaters - Keep gas if you have it already, electric heaters are always more problems and will cost more in the long run - gas is always easier and better. BTW, if you go to a plumbing wholesale warehouse (usually open only to licensed plumbers) the gas units are cheaper than electric.
When buying a home Mr. Perry seems to think that plumbing problems are easily fixed. Caveat Emptor - A person who bought a house that I passed on due to plumbing problems just spent $22,000 in getting it re-plumbed. From my experience I walk away from any house that 1) has foundation problems 2) has flooded recently 3) has major plumbing problems. I am highly suspicious of any house that has 1) Roof Problems 2) Electrical problems.
Things not mentioned that might help you out.
Automatic Rent Payments - I have about 50% of my tenants on automatic rent payments. It's easy to set up (talk to your bank) and you get your money every month on the same day.
If you have more than 5 units I strongly urge you to look into incorporating. It limits you liability and there are positive tax reasons to do so. This book barley mentions corporations and in a slightly negative way too.
If you buy in the right area and market your unit accordingly it is very easy to get some long term leases written up. I have approximately 70% of my tenants on 3 year or longer lease agreements.
While mentioned I have had a great deal of success with Townhomes and Condos - just be aware that this is very AREA sensitive. The plus side to these is that you can be a truly hands off landlord. Write your rental agreements that the tenants agree to take care of all repairs inside including AC/Heat. The associations take care of everything outside and all you do is collect the rent. True your returns are not as high, but it is the simplest form of rental management that I know of. Also, if the townhome/condo is slightly upper scale you will find that your vacancy rates drop considerably. The shortest tenant I have ever had in a townhome/condo was 1 year with my average being around 6 years.
Anyhow, This book is good for the beginners, that is why I gave it 4 stars.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
66 of 69 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not the best, but not the worst either, March 15, 2003
This review is from: Managing Rental Properties for Maximum Profit, Revised 3rd Edition: Save Time and Money with Greg Perry's Foolproof System for: *Buying the right ... tenants *Getting paid on time *Fixing and (Hardcover)
This is not the best book on land lording, and not even the second best, but none the less this is a book worth reading. However, if you are a serious landlord and are only going to read one book, this is not the one to read. The #1 book to read is "Landlording" by Leigh Robinson, which I rated as 5 stars. "The Landlording Kit" by Jeffrey Taylor is rated 4 stars by me. And Greg Perry's book and Richard Jorgensen's book "The New No-Nonsense Landlord" is 3 stars. The Milan book is a solid one star.
I still recommend that you read this book, just not ONLY this book. The author claims that he "owns and manages or co-manages nearly 50 rental properties." That's a pretty vague statement. He could own and manage 1 property and co-manage 45 properties and that would be "nearly 50 rental properties." One of his early points is that your name and phone number should not be advertised in the rental ad. He says that you should establish an open house Friday afternoon and Saturday morning and have all the prospective tenants come around at one time. This would save you phone time with prospective renters, but I'm not sure that this would always be effective. When renting averaged priced rentals in the season, this might work; but I can see times when renting a high priced property or renting out of season that there would be few maybe no prospects at your open house. In another chapter the author suggests filing your deed at the courthouse with the clerk of courts as routine with every lease signing. First of all in Pennsylvania the Clerk of Courts only handles criminal proceedings, so that wouldn't be the right place to file anyway. But more importantly filing the lease is an unnecessary cost as well as a very public window into your private affairs.
On the other hand another tip of driving by your rental properties when in the vicinity makes a lot of sense to me. Checking up on your rentals routinely can be a good dose of preventive medicine. Another excellent tip is to lower your tenant's utility bills. Even if the tenants pay the entire heat bill, insulation, storm windows, etc. will be appreciated by the tenants and lower heat bills will cause a renter to stay longer. Providing appliances is a great landlord debate. Personally we provide apartments with refrigerators and stoves, but many houses are rented without refrigerators. Some higher end properties are rented with dishwashers, and washer and dryers. If I house has a garbage disposal, we'll keep it. But if it breaks it will not be replaced. Recently one disposal had a tendency to attract beer bottle caps. First and second repair bills were at tenant expense. My philosophy is that the more and heavier things that the tenant owns, like refrigerators, washers, and dryers, the less likely they will move. But I can't give you proof for that.
Mr. Perry does recommend that you buy houses where the rent is 1-2% of the purchase price per month. In other words a $100,000 house would rent for $1,000 to $2,000 per month. That's a great idea but hard to execute in reality. Two percent is very hard but not impossible to get. You'll have to look hard and NOT be in a high priced area.
This is not a bad book, but it's not the best either. There are many tips in the book. The author has some good ideas, but other authors have more.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
37 of 37 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Solid advice for the small-time landlord, July 14, 1999
By A Customer
This book provides practical advice that makes sense for those of us who are not (yet) "big hitter" real estate investors. Its strengths include the many tips that will set your business apart from the competition and make your good tenants never want to leave. In particular, I appreciated Mr. Perry's human and reasonable approach to investing, a refreshing point of view in the sea of get-rich-quick real estate strategies. I thought the book had few shortcomings, but it seemed a little light in certain areas, such as basic formulas to analyse investment properties. I was suprised by this given the book's title and his emphasis on paying as little as possible for properties and only buying properties that provide positive cash flow before adding in tax benefits (this can be difficult if not impossible in certain parts of the country). Overall, the book is very good and I would recommend it without reservation to others that are considering becoming a small-time landlord.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
