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Hello. I am looking into renting out my house in a NY city for one to three years, while I think about whether I want to sell it. I also own a house in the country where I will live, about 80 miles away, in VT.
How do I find an agent to handle the rental? I have dealt with realtors to buy property. Do most agents also arrange rentals?
And is it better or worse or indifferent to rent it as partly furnished? I have plenty of furniture and don't mind leaving the furniture I would likely give away when I sell it. What's the general feeling on that?
Since I've never used Craigslist for anything, I don't want to start with that on my own, but don't care if my agent did.
Hello. I am looking into renting out my house in a NY city for one to three years, while I think about whether I want to sell it. I also own a house in the country where I will live, about 80 miles away, in VT.
How do I find an agent to handle the rental? I have dealt with realtors to buy property. Do most agents also arrange rentals?
And is it better or worse or indifferent to rent it as partly furnished? I have plenty of furniture and don't mind leaving the furniture I would likely give away when I sell it. What's the general feeling on that?
Since I've never used Craigslist for anything, I don't want to start with that on my own, but don't care if my agent did.
Most realtors are not interested in managing rental property. It is not what they are trained to do, and it is not what they got into real estate for. If they are interested in managing property, then usually,they have already formed a management company for that purpose.
You want to find a property management company to take care of this for you. But I will warn that they will take a big chunk out of the rental proceeds. For a single family dwelling, it really is not financially worth it.
Are there any agents who just handle setting up the rental and tenant, for a fee, not any kind of ongoing management?
When I rented in the past, in Boston, that's what I did. Found an ad with a second floor for rent, called, agent guy showed me, he took care of lease, dealt with landlord for everything after that.
Some agents will work rentals. I find that working with Landlords and Tenants increases my business, as today's renters are tomorrows buyers. Make sure you find a rental agent. BTW what part of NY?
Did you check the yellow pages for the area, specifically the real estate agents' web pages to see what services they offer? Many agencies offer rental services as part of their services. You have to do some legwork - like going to yellowpages.com and looking up real estate agents
Thanks Annie, I'll try that. I went to websites and didn't see rental services there. (So I came here and asked about it!) But I will check the phone book and call, and ask those people if they know of someone else if they don't do rentals, and see how it goes.
Can you ask a friend or neighbor? That is the way I'm handling one of my properties. I give him 10%, he does the initial walk through (gives them the key, shows them where everything is) and departure walk through. However, the tenants call me if something goes wrong or if they need "concierge" services and I arrange that with vendors I've established a relationship with. So far, so good; he gets a little extra cash and he lives on the same street. I get emails with anything he wants to report to me (e.g. extra people that are not on the lease, noise, etc.).
I hadn't thought of that. I think I have neighbors who would tell me about issues anyway (or would if I asked), so I'd rather make the rental/lease thing separate and clean.
But thanks for expanding my view and I'm sure I'll think about it again!
Thanks Annie, I'll try that. I went to websites and didn't see rental services there. (So I came here and asked about it!) But I will check the phone book and call, and ask those people if they know of someone else if they don't do rentals, and see how it goes.
Maybe try a google search for real estate rentals and the name of the town? Google is my friend lol and yes there are real estate brokerages that have separate rental and property management divisions.
Good luck.
PS Just wanted to add that at least with mine we roll both ways, in other words if a landlord is going to handle all maintenance, etc. then we show the rental but the landlord takes it from there.
Last edited by JustJoy; 12-28-2009 at 07:23 AM..
Reason: Addition
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