I have a newly rehabeed house that i need to rent like yesterday…Its been vacant about 2 months. Any hot tips / Suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks
Unless there is something terrible wrong (next to a highway, in a warzone, no ceiling) the market is telling you what’s wrong…the price is too high.
Advertise.
In some places, that means sticking a “For Rent” sign with your number on it in the front yard. In other places, that means running ads, putting an ad in the papers, listing with an agent, listing with a property management agent, etc.
Keith
Assuming that your fundamentals are in line (as Rich noted) and the demand is there, you problem is most likely awareness.
If nothing else, an ad needs to be in the community paper every Thurs-Sunday until you rent the thing…
If you want to get really creative, try advertising and hosting a renter’s “open house”—give away door prizes, free food and drinks and discounts/coupons from local merchants (get the merchants to foot the bill for the open house too as “sponsors” of the event), etc. for all those the COME, SEE & FILL OUT an application.
Grand prize? They get to rent your house (lucky them) and maybe you give them a half off rent for the first month or some other incentive for the priviledge of restoring cash flow (lucky you).
Back door prize? You’ll have a few applications left over that might contain potential tenant candidiates for your other properties.
Although I just made this up, if it works in sales—why wouldn’t it work in rentals?
Worth a thought anyway…
Regards,
Scott Miller
If your home is in a good size area, check out craigslist.org. You will get alot of traffic. Make your title catchy… Also you can list it with a real estate agent that specializes in rentals because it is a lower commission to them. Remember they will take 1months rent or 10% of the gross yearly rent.
You can also goto the realtors doing flat rate listings for $199 and just offer to pay 1 full months rent as a commission which will generate more hits for you.
Offer 1/2months rent if you move in by thr 15th, so you just collect F/L/Sec and basically 15 free days on you. I look at like this. Most people like to move on thr 1st and just looking b/c of when the lease ends. So if you got someone looking around, tell them you will give them 15 free days and it give them time to move slowly if they like instead doing it on 1 day. You can always take chances getting that tenant for an ASAP move, but not often enough.
Also if your town/rental market is cheaper than some other close by areas, let people know in the advertisment, especially if your area is similar in lifestyle and social climate.
Ex. I ran an ad for 2months in newspaper, got maybe 4 phone calls a month, Was asking 1275 month for a 3/2. Avg rents in that complex is about 1350-1450 so I was low since its been vacant 3 months. Well I changed it up on craigslist and said move to Palm Beach county, its cheaper than Broward and still 30min from everything. Got 5 calls the 1st day from broward people looking to move… Rented it out the next day… To someone wanting to move on the 15th… I told them today when we signed lease, here is key, you have 15 free days to use it and get stuff in… She was so happy and gave me an extra $100 for the 15days as a tip.
just give the 1st tenant a FREE MONTH…whats the big deal of another mortgage payment…dont be greedy
ad;
1 MONTH FREE RENT - No catches! xxx-xxx-xxxx! 1st one gets its!
p.s. greed stops a lot of good deals
Robert Doncaster - “RAD”
rentclicks.com. I had many renters to pick from easy. It’s cheap, too and this is one place they look.
Also, spend a few hundred bucks to get a nice wooden sign and put flyers on the front of it. I use my sign over and over again. Mine says “For rent or sale by owner” and I have lots of calls from that. Most put wimpy cheap signs out that have little impact
give them 2 months free at end of lease…get the usuals up front + last month…u need to mega screen …
get them in the place…use whatever gimmick
i would lose 1-3 months of rent to get someone in…especially now with this economy,over the long haul that loss represent peanuts…
always look at the long haul…not just a compartment to get there
my 2 cents
Robert A. Doncaster, Jr.
Import/Export Entrepreneur & Investor
*** DO YOUR HOMEWORK ***
Chicago Illinois USA
& sometimes Salzburg, Austria
Spend $900 bucks and advertise “free big screen tv”. The locals eat that up here in my market.