Why should landlords use a fully managed service?

As a landlord the decision whether to use a property management company like ourselves can be hard to make.  Managing your rental property or portfolio alone means you retain full control and you keep 100% of all the profits you make.  This can be a full time job to manage your property efficiently and can be very time consuming for landlords.

At Cross & Co we believe a good property management company can relieve the time consuming duties and the responsibility of managing your own property;  this can add significant value to your investment.

Below are a few benefits we believe of using a property management company:

’More time for landlords to focus on themselves’ – This is the most attractive reason for using a fully managed service.  We can cover all aspects of managing your property or portfolio so that you are free to enjoy other aspects of your already busy lifestyle.  Whether it’s spending time day to day raising your family, spending time travelling abroad, investing time in your chosen career or perhaps starting your own new business venture; by using a property management agent this will give you peace of mind and allow you to concentrate on all other aspects of your chosen lifestyle whilst you enjoy the returns of your investment.

’Keeping tenants happy’ – Busy landlords may sometimes struggle to find time to ensure their tenants are satisfied.  Companies such as ourselves have measures in place to ensure tenant satisfaction.  We believe the key to making our tenants happy are features such as arranging prompt property maintenance, ensuring tenants have access to us outside of the usual office hours, having emergency tradesmen in place outside of normal hours and during holiday periods and fully protecting their deposit payments under a Government approved scheme.  These are just a few key features which give tenants the peace of mind and ensure them that the safety of their chosen rental property is priority.  It is a proven fact and something that we work hard on maintaining that a happy tenant equals a happy landlord.

’Better quality of tenant’ – Sourcing a tenant for your property can be stressful to say the least, we fully understand the frustrations of accepting a tenant only for them to pay their rent late, damage your property, upset neighbours or even refuse to leave your property.  We can assure you that we are committed to finding only the best and most suitable tenants for you via our vetting process which includes a formal non-intrusive chat at the viewings stage and through referencing checks including checks on their credit, employers and previous landlords if applicable.  We also require a guarantor for each individual tenancy and make this a strict company policy to ensure there are alternative routes available if a tenant ever defaults on rental payments and/or affects the condition of your property.

’Shorter tenancy voids’ – Sourcing new tenants for your property is sometimes not as easy as you may expect, we believe your property should be visible on the property market and visible to the right people; with a network of potential tenants awaiting properties and the extensive knowledge in marketing properties to the right tenants you can expect much shorter tenancy voids when working with a property management company.  At Cross & Co we understand that for every day your property is empty you are not making a profit on your investment and that’s why we aim to keep the voids between tenancies to a minimum.

’Access to trusted contractors’ – As a landlord you have a responsibility and safety obligations to ensure when a tenant needs maintenance work completed you don’t want to leave them waiting for works to be completed.  If you rush into finding contractors when works needs completing this can result in the work not being carried out to a satisfactory standard and this may lead to tenants being left at risk of injury, increase tenancy voids and failure as a landlord to meet your safety responsibilities.  We have access to a range of trusted contractors to carry out work quickly and efficiently to the right standard.  Some of our trusted contractors we have used for well over ten years and have formed a very good working relationship together.  Our network of contractors include plumbers, gas engineers, electricians, cleaners, builders and general maintenance companies so we can arrange prompt maintenance when required and sort payment of contractors invoices on your behalf.

‘Legal worries sorted’ – Whatever level of service you use with Cross & Co we are here to give you expert help and advice in changes to law.  We are members of ‘The Property Ombudsman’ so you can rest assured that your property is in safe hands.  Whilst still being very profitable, the buy to let market has been faced with various new laws and legislation changes over recent years so if you fail as a landlord to keep on top of these regulations it can result in problems occurring and can lead to huge fines; as an example if you don’t protect your property correctly currently with the right type of tenancy agreement this can result in  you not being able to issue the right notices for a tenant to vacate a property, this can lead to unwanted legal costs to get assistance in getting your tenant to leave the premises.  As a property management company we have access to the right types of legal paperwork to give you peace of mind that your property is looked after under the current laws and legislation.

We do hope that you have found this blog of interest to you.  If we can assist you as a landlord in anyway please do not hesitate to contact us and we will be very happy to advise you.