Austin Property Management Blog

203 Settlers Home Drive, Cedar Park, TX 78613

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We have made it through yet another very busy summer season. Air conditioners were broken, appliances were placed on back order and all the while, our staff held it together. We truly appreciate your patience and trust in us in these difficult times.

This being said, we wanted to share a few updates with you. If you haven’t heard yet, there is a ban on evictions through the end of the year. This hasn’t been terrible for us as a company, as we have been very diligent about asking people to leave or setting up payment plans where it makes sense. Follow the link if you'd like to send a note to Congress requesting they enact rental assistance for housing providers.

The good news is that Austinites are still working. We are experiencing growth with new businesses coming to town. I am pleased to state that Tesla has officially broken ground on their new facility for the Cyber Truck and we are excited to have them.

Rents have remained stable in most areas and the inventory of homes for sale is still in short supply. These are two key indicators that keep our leadership team optimistic about the market in Central Texas.

As you may have noticed we have brought on more staff and we are working to better serve you. We are working to continually improve our processes and can’t thank you enough for your patience and loyalty. You may be getting calls from new voices, so I just thought I would let you know.

Lastly, we are in the process of partnering with a large insurance company that we think has fantastic rates for landlords. They have already saved me money while upping my coverage, so I am a believer. More details to come in the next couple of months, but this should be a huge win for all of our clients.

We appreciate your trust in us. Call or email any time.

Thank you,

Jason Huval, MBA
Broker and Partner
Stone Oak Property Management

When owning a rental property in Austin, Texas, or considering purchasing one, there is one factor that outweighs them all - how much can I charge for rent?

It’s the factor that will drive your reasoning for purchasing the property in the first place. You could have overpaid to acquire your rental home and received a bad deal, but if you can make more in rent than you pay towards your note every month then you are cash flowing!

The key to success - and way less vacancy on your Austin rental home - is pricing the property to be competitive in the market. Austin has no shortage of renters and individuals moving to the city every day. In turn, we live in one of the most competitive markets for landlords to own a rental property.

If you price your property’s rental rate too high you could risk sitting on the market as more accurately priced properties lease in a matter of days - sometimes hours! Let’s say your South Austin rental property can earn $1,700/month. Instead, you decide to have your property listed at $1,800/month and it sits for a month before it garners any real interest from potential renters. After just one month of sitting on the market, you’ve effectively lost money over the course of a year compared to leasing the property 30 days prior to the $1,700/month rate. 

With that said, pricing your property too low on the rental market can leave you with more risk exposure to being hit by larger surprise maintenance costs, etc. 

So how can Austin, Texas landlords accurately price their rental property?

There are a couple of ways to determine how much your property can earn in rent every single month. With that said, the most accurate way for landlords in Austin to correctly price their rental property in the Austin rental market is to run reports on comparable lease properties in your area.

Running comps will give you the best idea of what other properties in your immediate area of Austin are earning in rent every month. Targeting homes similar in size, # of bedrooms, # of bathrooms, and types of amenities and seeing how much they are asking for / leased for can give you a great idea of what your Austin rental home should earn in rent.

Using resources to look up homes for rent like Zillow and other sites can give you a great idea of what’s currently out there listed on the market. This can help give landlords an approximate picture of what other rentals in the area want to earn in rent. This doesn’t give you the entire picture though and leaves out a big piece of the picture - what the homes actually leased for.

To get the best, and most accurate idea of what your property can earn in rent every single month would be to work with an Austin property management company. Having access to the local MLS, Austin property managers can pull comps from past leases and show you exactly what properties in your area were able to obtain. Interested in learning how much your property can earn in rent? Claim your free Austin rental home market analysis from our team here at Stone Oak Property Management.

^^ Claim your free CMA Packet for your Austin, Texas rental home.

220 Kookaburra Bend, Kyle, TX 78640

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1912 Petrified Forest Drive, Austin, TX 78747

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9420 Shady Oaks Drive, Austin, TX 78729

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3400 Bratton Ridge Crossing, Austin, TX 78728

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I’m sure you may have heard or read about Texas being a hotbed of activity for COVID-19, but many Austinites are still working and people are still definitely spending money. My children go to school in Pflugerville and the parent survey that Pflugerville ISD recently sent out showed that nearly 60% of households that answered the survey were not financially affected by the outbreak of COVID-19 in the Austin area. As of now, our schools are remote for the first three weeks. Once that time has passed the district will take a better look at the situation and decide on allowing the kids to return to their classrooms. I bring this up because we have many properties in the Pflugerville area and other similar suburbs all over town that are experiencing the same thing. 

Stone Oak Property Management is still being very careful as a company and most of our staff continue to work remotely. However, our production and level of service have not faltered, in fact, many of the staff seem happier and more productive. This is great news for everyone as we want everyone to enjoy the work they do. We have expanded our staff by adding a couple of new team members to better serve our clients and their properties. 

For the most up-to-date and accurate info on the Austin MSA COVID-19 cases visit the link at the end of this paragraph. This data comes directly from the City of Austin. You can sort by cases, deaths and it has a great break down by age and other various factors. You can check out the Austin COVID-19 Data for yourself.

In my previous posts, I had mentioned how large companies were being attracted to Austin and moving operations to the area. Well, the hiring has now begun. There is a brief article below from our local news station stating that Tesla has officially started posted jobs! We are thrilled to have them here and the positive economic impact they will have on our beautiful city. 

We're also becoming a part of the military-industrial complex on the tech side.  On August 11^th BAE Systems announced an expansion of their footprint in Austin by building a $150M campus that will double their workforce here.  BAE is categorized as a tech company but they are really military contractors. 

Last of the pretty big economic news that I wanted to share is that Amazon announced a few weeks ago that they're expanding operations in Central Texas by opening a new facility in Kyle. They have a new large facility that is currently under construction in my neck of the woods, Pflugerville. 

Lastly, rents haven’t shown signs of weakening. We have been collecting rents at nearly normal rates and most tenants that have found themselves in tough financial positions have either made payment arrangements with us or voluntarily moved out. We do have pending evictions, but most can’t be filed until September due to the moratorium on residential evictions filed by the City of Austin.

I will leave you with this - wash your hands, don’t panic, and don’t believe nearly anything on social media. My favorite quote that sums it up was sent to me by my wife from her Facebook and was: “Don’t believe everything on the internet - Abraham Lincoln”. 

Please don't hesitate to contact our Austin property management team if we can be of assistance to you in any way. Our team can be reached directly at 512.617.6766 or you can use the form on our site to contact us.

Author:

Jason Huval, MBA
Broker and Partner
Stone Oak Property Management

12413 Split Rail Parkway, Austin, TX 78750

1,908 SF | 3 Bed | 2 Bath

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17712 Limpia Creek Drive, Round Rock, TX 78664

2,154 SF | 4 Bed | 3 Bath

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