T&H Realty Services Blog

When you think about rental property expenses, things like maintenance, management fees and mortgages are probably what come to mind.

But there’s one item you may not find when Googling typical costs associated with owning rental real estate.

Vacancy.

Now, you can argue that vacancy isn’t an expense per se. It doesn’t show up as a line item on your Profit & Loss statement, but it does have an impact on your income, and is what we’ve called time and time again a “cash flow killer.”

We always advise our Central Indiana Investors to consider vacancy as an associated cost of owning a rental property and to budget accordingly. A general rule of thumb is to expect your property to be vacant for at least one month out of the year or, at a minimum, 8%. Most industry experts will argue that 10% is a better number.

Fortunately, vacancy is currently at a cyclical low nationally, and Indianapolis is set to see a vacancy rate of 6.9%, which is down 70 basis points from 2016 according to homeunion.com.

Even though single family home vacancy rates are on the decline, it’s critical to be prepared for when your property sits vacant longer than you anticipated.

Technology has come a long way since we started in the real estate business back in 2000.

Self-Showing services are one of many new technologies that have come to the forefront of the rental property industry in the last few years. These services have changed the game when it comes to showing rentals and we are a real-life example of how they work.

There are a few major self-showing services out there right now, but we use a company called Rently.

Having used Rently for over a year now, we’ve had ample time to see the pros and cons of the service and thought we would share our opinion and experience with it.

This review is not paid for or solicited by Rently.

 Indianapolis rental property management is essential for many reasons, and the ability to effectively market your home is one of the main reasons you would choose to work with a property manager.

Every property management company will tell you how great they are at marketing your home. It seems like most property managers don’t have a firm grasp on what it really takes, however.

 Many people often ask me about how long it takes to lease an Indianapolis rental property and what needs to be done before it can go on the rental market. There are a few things you can do to ensure you rent your house fast: