Increasing Rents

Hello if I supply stove and fridge and washer/dryer, how much more should I increase the monthly rent?

I don’t know that I would “increase the rent”, I might have the tenants “rent” the appliances from me at just below the going rate of appliance rentals for your area.

You can only increase the rent to the market rent. Sometimes adding those things won’t really increase the value of the rental so your answer will vary.

If you have a waiting list of people trying to get into your rentals, you’re not charging enough, if you can’t get someone to rent it, you’re charging too much.

You really need to know what the rents in the area are going for before picking on an amount.

Some state laws do require you to provide a stove, but not a fridge or washer dryer. If you’re going to provide washer dryer and you have multiple units, you mind as well get the coin-op type, in some areas water and electricity do add up.

I would stick with just fridge and stove and forget about buying the washer and dryer. For the upcharge in rent that the washer and dryer will add you will lose more in the purchase of the machines and the ongoing maintainence. As you know these things do require fixing frequently and with tenants that tend to abuse things that they don’t own you will have more expenses on your hand than you want. I would leave the hookups for these things there if they want to bring their own but reserve the right to do the connection yourself to limit the chance of a water leak. For the fridge and stove check your local used appliance shop. I’ve gotten used appliances in the past and they have been very reliable and affordable. In my area most apartments come with a fridge and stove as generally tenants don’t have their own or can’t afford their own, its generally expected that most apartments will have these things.

Unless it is a coin op laundary then I wouldn’t add a washer/dryer. I like my units to have laundary hooks, but I don’t like to supply the washer/dryer. I always put in my ads “laundary hooks ups” but they can go and get a cheap used washer/dryer.

 There are basically two ways to handle this:
 1. The  tenant pays more for rent with these appliances.  This would increase your appraised values, so if the strategy is to have appreciation, then you would do well to provide landscaping, appliances, whatever to get the tenant to pay more per month in rent.
 2. You can persuade a tenant to move in with cheap appliances that you pick up from the second hand appliance store, with a lease agreement clause that specifies basically: "tenant may keep these appliances upon completion of a two year lease, but I do not guarantee them"...this provides strong incentive to move in, but if the appliances break, there is minimal hassle for you to come in and fix them.
 I would increase the rent so that these appliances are paid for in two years if they stay with the building (I buy new), one year if the tenant gets to keep them (I buy used).
 I have low income tenants that bring their own appliances; I have high income tenants that I bought the appliances for to get them to move in.  Whether you do this depends upon your tenants.

The increase in rent would depend upon the market. Providing washer/dryers are a good incentive. When I advertised a unit with a washer/dryer, some of the prospective tenants, including the one I rented to, said they were interested in the washer/dryer and wanted to see it.

Whenever possible, I plan to include them in my rentals.

In my standard lease, there is some language that I although I may provide the appliances, I am not responsible for repair and/or maintenance. I typically service them anyway, but that doesn’t mean that you need to.

Relying on the tenant to service them is a mixed bag. For starters you don’t have to pay to have them fixed, big plus right? However they may tend not to get them serviced when they need it and just not ever bother to fix them if they break. They may consider just going to the local coin-op laundromat to do their laundry rather than fixing their in-unit appliances (penny wise, dollar foolish but tenants don’t always make rational decisions). They will probably be still in this broken condition when they move out meaning you have to fix them. But wait you say, the security deposit can handle the repair! What happens if the place is trashed, has holes in the wall, and the carpets/flooring is in dire need of replacement? You already don’t have enough money from the deposit to cover all of this and you get to pay for fixing the appliances as well increasing your overall loss. Hopefully you have included enough of a rental increase to cover replacement or major repairs rather frequently to cover any problems that come up should you get a real winner tenant. If I were to do it I would only buy used machines and upcharge the rent at least $100 a month, this would guarantee me enough money coming in to replace them annually if need be and have a small fund to cover minor repairs.

A brand new washer and dryer only costs a total of $550 and around $100 used, so you probably don’t need to raise the rent $100 a month. I would just charge the max you can for rent, that’s what I do and it works great. That way when things break you actually have the money to fix it. But break even for you supplying a washer/dryer is probably closer to $10 a month, so anything above that is gravy.

If you are thinking of adding a washer/dryer I would worry about the water usage and the fact that a non-coin operated washer/dryer invites friends and family to use your free machines.

I think it partially depends on the market and current practices in your area. Most apartments come with a refrigerator and stove at a minimum.

I recently faced the same decision. I decided to supply a refrigerator and stove. Because my rental property is in a middle income neighborhood, I decided to also supply a dishwasher, washing machine and dryer in order to give myself a competitive advantage and satisfy the needs and desires of the prospective tenants for this neighborhood, while charging $50 more for rent than the comparables. However, in the lease I stated that the refrigerator, stove and dishwasher were “leased” to the the tenants and I would be responsible for the maintance, but the washing machine and dryer were “loaned” and the tenant would be responsible for maintenance. The reason I did this was because the washing machine and dryer can be broken easily from improper use such as over loading, where as the refrigerator, stove and dishwasher do not easily lend themselves to improper use. So far, I have not experienced any problems. Hope this helps.

Three weeks ago I bought a used washer and dryer for $50 for one my properties. Then today my boss said she bought a new washer and dryer and I could have her old ones for free. So getting a used washer and dryer is easy and cheap.

So there is little costs to you to add a used washer and dryer. Stoves and fridges are a requirement in a unit for me.