My wife and I are considering purchasing a house, I have 17 years in CG and intend on coming back to it. After we transfer I would like to rent it, how do we protect our investment? Lease, Property MGR ?? All new to us, any advice would be great. Tks CC
If you get a property manager, get a good one... They will get at least 10% of the rent... I had one in Corpus Christi Tx.. He wasn't worth a $hit. I have rented a few of my houses out.. Just be sure you have a good lease...
Where is your house located? If you can rent it out to military that would be a plus..
Personally, I just do it myself. In fact I have someone coming in tonight from South Dakota for Bike Week (an eye glass vendor).. I rent out a 3 bedroom 3 bath 2 car garage furnished townhouse. 2k per week and 1k deposit.
Remember, the key is a good lease... I wish I had one of my old ones.. It was very good.
I recommend the National Association of Independent Landlords. Through them you can run credit checks and get prospective tenants FICO scores, and also report delinquent tenants to the credit reporting bureau's. They also have many other resources, such as leases, etc.
Make sure you know local, state and federal landlord/tennant laws. Plenty of good books on the subject, just make sure they are new! For instance, military clauses as part of and inclusive in the lease document itself are virtually worthless to you. SCRA requires a sperate document be signed by a military lessee before any of their SCRA rights are affected/waived. The theory of federal preemption makes anything said about it at the local or state level pretty irrelevant.
A less technical approach but has worked for me for ten years. Ask a friend/neighbor to manage the property for you. Pay them a percentage of rent recieved and let them run it like its theres. It's great! Little shack in Florida will be paid for this fall! Time to kick back in the recliner, relax and put on Gunsmoke, starring James Arness as Matt Dillon.....ooops..used that line already.
Check out this website: www.rhol.com. There is a yearly membership fee, but we thought it was worth every penny. The site can link you to pages to help you write a lease that is legal in your particular state. The are Q&A sections that cover the do s and dont s and can spare you the headaches.
Our last lease was 4 pages long, had 17 or 18 sections and each one had to be initialed by the renter. We covered everything from junk cars in the drive to where and how they could hang pictures or artwork.
We tried a property manager and it was a disaster. He was licensed and had a good reputation, but only took his monthly fee as the tenants did what they wanted. (We were over 600 miles away and he didn't think we'd find out.) We ended up having the neighbors watch the place - they had a stake in it since they wanted to keep the neighborhood safe, clean and quiet.
I'm renting my house right now, and have no regrets. Try renting to a Coastie first. If they start getting funny on you, you can contact their Chief. If no success, try renting to a federal employee. I'm renting to a person who's an Air Traffic Controller. I told him, that if he paid me, via direct deposit, I would waive the first, last, and deposit. It has worked great.
This is the second time I've rented. The first time I used a property manager. It worked out well, but they usually require from you, one months rent, and 10% of all rental income. I believe the one months rent is due to them for every year they take care of the property. Like I said, it worked out well, but I really hated giving them money.
I have a sample lease if you would like it. It's pretty detailed.
This is just my opinion based on my observation, so take it for what it's worth and please don't kill the messenger. Most of the people I know in your situation, never move back to the house they originally intended to move in after retirement from AD. Why? Many reasons, the end up taking a 2nd job elsewhere, some no longer like the neighborhood, etc, etc, etc. The few that I know that have indeed moved back, are those who have bought a house in an area where the real estate has gone through the roof, even during a slow market like the current one. A good example, DC area. My wife's boss ended up moving to the house he bought 15 years ago when he was a young CAPT in the USAF because the same house in his same street would have cost him 5 times what he paid 15 years ago. In the DC area, his $200K house back in 1993 goes for $1M. Personally, I don't want or need the headache, so I rather sell when I leave and buy when I move in.
