My wife and I recently listed out home for rent with a property manager. I found a great property management company that I have really enjoyed working with after asking tons of questions before hiring a property manager.
Now that we have started to get the ball rolling finding renters and even showing our house to potential renters I have found a few expenses that have cropped up. Some of these costs were expected, but a few of these new expenses have kind of caught me a little off guard.
Unexpected Expenses Of Being A Landlord
- Advertising fee with the property manager – $100
- Getting our HVAC tuned up – $100
- Purchasing a home warranty – $500 per yearOverdue yard maintenance – $300
- Storage unit since we are downsizing – $150 a month
- Moving truck rental – $300
- Maintenance fund our property manager requested – $500
- Carpet steam cleaning – $200
TOTAL INITIAL COSTS – $2,150
My wife and I knew that we were going to move sooner or later because of our jobs. We are actually making this move on our own terms and timeline instead of our employer’s.
So, the good part about these expenses that we are incurring is that we would have had to make these improvements and spend the money when we sold our house anyway. We are just getting them out of the way now on our own terms. Moving to another nearby town has forced us to make these changes now
Never been a land lord. But I think some of these expenses are one-time. And no matter what be the expense, you got to rent it out as otherwise you will lose money on house tax and utilities.
Hopefully there aren’t too many other expenses that pop up. I would think the key is finding really good tenants that will stay a long time and cause minimal problems. Then everything lasts longer and they are less likely to be wasting your time during their tenancy.
My husband and I aren’t cut out for being landlords but I know many people do make money with it.
Make sure your property manager does regular inspections. I’ve learned the hard way you can’t count on renters to tell you about problems until they get to be BIG problems.
I am glad to hear that you were able to move on your own terms and when you wanted. That makes this unexpected small fortune a little more reasonable. Plus, you have set yourself up for a long term return with renting out your home!
I would have to agree with the post its a great time for young people to buy a home simply because their are so many places in the country where home prices have become attractive. Thirty year fixed rate mortgage rates are now under four percent. I can remember years back when housing was king long before the housing bust. Everybody had the expection that home prices would always increase. Even myself as far as that go’s almost believed in this fairy tale. And it was just that a fairy tale as long as it lasted. I don’t have the data in front of me but I think their was only one or two years from 1945 to the early 2000’s that national home prices declined. Their were pockets of weakness in texas during the oil bust of the 1980’s but over all prices increased steadly from 1945 to about 2006. One giant bubble
My boyfriend and I were looking into buying a house last year, and one of our criteria was that it had to have an income suite. It’s expensive being a landlord, but it’s more expensive not!
This is a great post, thanks! My BF and I just submitted an offer for an investment property. We live locally so we don’t THINK we need to hire a property management company and my BF is pretty good with repairs so we shall see how that plays out.
I’ll definitely post some costs of becoming a landlord once that happens to us.