Austin Property Management Blog

Working as a property manager, it’s easy to think the job won’t be that hard and that most of what you’ll be doing is collecting rent payments. Then you come to find out that property management is much harder than first anticipated. Part of any venture in life is learning from your mistakes and as a property owner in Austin, Texas, this includes you. Here we’ll go over some of the mistakes to avoid if you choose to self-manage your Austin rental home.

Charging too much or too little

If you’ve chosen to work with an agent to help lease your property this shouldn’t affect you too much. However, let’s imagine you’re choosing to find a tenant for your property on your own. You post ads for your property to the usual sites such as Craigslist or Facebook, but is this helping? You might find a tenant, but do you know how much to charge them? Realtors have access the MLS which houses a lot of real estate data, some which is important in this situation. Working with a property manager would have allowed you to run comps in your area to accurately pinpoint the amount you could charge for your Austin rental home. Self-managing owners do not have this luxury and instead price their property on their own. How are you to know where the market stands in your neighborhood year after year? You could compare yours to other listings you find in the area, but this doesn’t reveal the bigger picture and the homes your comparing to could be significantly different than your own. Your best bet is to consult with a Austin property manager and see if they will run comps for you. They are happy to help and it’s a great relationship to build as you never know what will happen in the future that doesn’t allow you to manage your home anymore!

Failure to Keep Up with Maintenance

How-to videos on YouTube do help, but that’s no way to get things done when your tenants are facing an emergency situation during the hot summers of Austin. If you’re an owner who likes to take it upon yourself to address and repair any issues because you think it will save you some money be careful that you are prepared for and knowledgeable of the task at time. Tenants like to know that their issues are addressed as soon as possible and the instant your great tenants begin to think maintenance takes to long for their home they will start to look for other rental options in Austin.

Addressing Tenant Issues & Evictions

One of the biggest problems with self-managing your Austin rental property is the relationship you might build with your tenants. Everything is good, until it’s not. The problem with DIY Austin landlords is that they often try and befriend their tenants instead of approaching it like a business. When a tenant is non-compliant or in violation of their lease it may be your first instinct to try and work with them. This can lead to many things such as the tenant taking advantage of the friendship you’ve built. The instant any tenant is in violation of their lease you need to be ready to start the eviction process. Your relationship with your tenant can get in the way of this and the longer you let issues last the harder it will be to evict them. Avoid any bad habits such as partial payments. Those payments usually take longer and longer…

You Haven’t Factored in all Expenses

Managing your property is not cheap! DIY Austin landlords seem to think that they will be saving lots of money by not hiring a property management company in Austin, Texas to handle their management. However, you won’t be offered the same rates from vendors the property manager would and this alone can add up significantly over the course of a year. We regularly work with owners who struggle with the finances of their property and estimating the true cost that goes into managing your Austin rental home.

If you’re struggling with any of these issues please don’t hesitate to contact our Austin property management team!

12401 Los Indios Trail #60, Austin, TX 78729

Austin Homes for Rent

719 Honeysuckle Drive, Leander, TX 78641

Austin Homes for Rent

If you own a rental property in Austin, Texas you’re probably aware of how expensive property maintenance can be and this is usually a cost landlords tend to ignore. Why do you need to replace that siding that still looks okay? Or why replace that roof that is only missing a few shingles? The truth of the matter is that there are quite a few features about your rental property that require regular upkeep and Stone Oak Management, as your property management company in Austin, TX, can help in many ways! We work with a network of specialized vendors throughout the greater Austin, Texas region and have access to reduced rates from these vendors due to our bulk of work. We pass these savings onto you, the rental property owner! In addition to savings on maintenance and repairs, we help you comply with property code and help avoid lawsuits for any unwanted property mishaps. Maintenance will always be required for a property and no matter how careful your tenant might be it can get expensive fast if not property addressed in time.

Maintenance costs are no fun – we agree! However, spending money on preventative maintenance can save you thousands of dollars down the road. Our Austin property managers regularly inspect properties to see what sort of maintenance might be required for your Austin rental. We will then determine the opportune time to address these issues. For instance, if we notice your roof is need of repair, we’ll let you know as soon as we discover these issues. Addressing these quick is key and can help you avoid any leakage or problems caused by the damage. This results in you avoiding the costly repair that could have been had the issues not been addressed before getting out of hand! You’ll avoid tenants being unhappy due to maintenance issues and protect their personal property. We make sure the work is done correctly the first time so that issues don’t repeat themselves down the road. As mentioned, our Austin property managers can provide these maintenance repairs at a reduced rate due to our relationships with our network of vendors and contractors, resulting in lower costs for you.

Any new tenants we place in your Austin rental home expect the place they are moving into to be clean and ready for them! Your carpets don’t need to be new, but they must be clean. A fresh coat of paint could be needed, and simply cleaning the walls can make the interior look much better. Our Austin property managers help make these decisions for you and ensure all things are taken care of in a professional, timely manner. Let our Austin property management team save you time and money while providing a stress-free rental property experience.

4709 Misty Slope Lane, Austin, TX 78744

Austin Homes For Rent

4408 Avenue D, Austin, Texas 78751

Austin Homes For Rent

505 Willow Walk Drive, Pflugerville, TX 78660

Pflugerville Homes for Rent

As a landlord, you may deal with problem tenants once or twice in your property's lifetime. If the way you screen tenants is poor it could happen more often than that. However, these problems all have a solution, even if that means performing an eviction to reclaim your property. 

In an ever-connected world like ours where a camera is always recording or someone with a cellphone only several feet away, setting fire to your own Leander rental property isn't the best idea. Well, that's exactly what this landlord in Leander, Texas did. Fed up with his tenants and their inability to pay he set fire to his rental home with tiki torches while the tenants were inside. Below is the video provided From Austin's KXAN news network. 

With many remedies to problem tenants occupying your property - setting fire to it while they are inside is not one of them. There are services in greater Austin that offer help to self-managing landlords such as Texas Tenant Evictions. They provide an eviction service in Austin and the surrounding areas to those without a property manager. This is just one of the many resources available to you as a self-managing owner of rental property in greater Austin, Texas.

In the event your tired of dealing with tenants and you'd like to avoid prison, our Austin property managers provide a full-service management experience rendering your property a stress-free investment for you. You can learn more about property management services and what to expect under our 'Landlords' tab at the top. 

Let’s imagine you just closed on your first investment property. You’re feeling great about acquiring assets and building your real estate portfolio. Your plan is to get your property ready for use and place a tenant as quickly as possible. Wait.. do you even know how much your property is going to rent for?

You might have worked with a Realtor when purchasing this home, and since you knew it would be an investment you could have had them run the comps for letting you know what you might get from your investment every month before you even purchased the property.

What if you didn’t though? Just look around online and see what you find and slap a price on it? Not so fast! Everyone has an idea what they want out of their rental property every single month, but is it justified? Price your rental to low and then you’re stuck receiving less than market rate on your investment. Price yourself to high and you’re property could sit there vacant with you floating the payment every month. There’s a process to accurately pricing your rental so that you receive the most money possible every month it’s occupied.

Be wary of using the large real estate websites such as Zillow, Trulia, etc. These are large companies who work nationwide and sometimes their data is inaccurate for sales history and price points. This can lead to you doing an analysis with incorrect info, leaving you with an inaccurate price for your Austin rental property.

Your best bet is to work with a professional in the area on pricing your rental. Property Managers and Realtors will have access to the local MLS and be able to see comparable properties and their rental history in the neighborhood your rental is located. Our Austin property management experts have been working in the various regions of Austin for over a decade. After learning your properties address, we analyze the market rents from the past several years on all the properties in your rental home’s location. We compare your properties offerings – square footage, washer/dryer, appliances, year built, etc – to accurately determine the highest price point that your Austin rental home will rent for. The best part is that we offer this service completely free to any property owner curious about what their property will rent for. In just under half an owner we can provide you with a detailed report and comparable properties justifying our take on your property’s rental rate.

Curious what your Austin rental home will rent for? Receive a free rental market analysis from our team at Stone Oak today! Just provide us some details or give us a call via 512.617.6766!

312 Blackman Trail, Hutto, TX 78634

Hutto Homes For Rent