Bundling multiple IPs with 1 PM?

I have one PM who is a small 2 man band. When he goes on holidays he has another PM company handle his work.

He generally only handles one half of Perth but has handled some outlier properties for us for a year until we demolished them as a favour - this is where having one PM comes in handy - the ability to ask for favours.

Perth is pretty small so having one PM who is a really good PM can handle the 'local knowledge'

In my case my PM is 50 years old so he brings an awful lot of life knowledge, suburb experience and work ethic to the table. He's not an agency where I'll be looked after by an ever changing revolving door of 20 yos who live at home and won't yell at my tenants for being *****.

 

This is a big issue with most agencies.

When I was an investor myself and had my own properties with property managers, came across this all the time

 

And, in my experience, a lot of these 20yos are female.

All of our PMs are women but they are in the 25 to 45 age bracket. Without being sexist, I find women of these age group make the best PMs.

 

Have to be careful what you / I say for risk of offending anyone, but I've found the same with my own investment properties in other states, and with previous workmates back when I was just an employee in this game.

There are certain genders and age groups that work better than others. Exceptions to every rule of course, but it comes down to life experience, empathy level, investment experience and general level of BS that they can tolerate.

 

A big factor in having separate PMs is that 3 of my 5 are off the plan apartments.
The appeal of giving the business to the PM division of the sales agency (so 3 different agencies right there) offers several advantages:
- pre-settlement access for private inspections to get a tenant in asap. Don't care if they're not perfect tenants, just need rent coming in and clear that deadline initial flooding of supply phase.
- all had some kind of first year bonus (Terri Scheer/EBM insurance paid for, or 50% off depreciation reports), half week letting fee vs 1 week etc.

Fortunately I haven't had that many emergencies come up to see how well the PM manages the issue. It's a good problem to have but makes it hard to decide which agents cut lose and which ones to bundle my business with.

 

I've arranged pre-settlement access to get photographer through or applicants through before. Im not sure which agency sold the property is relevant here.

You certainly should do the former or otherwise the latter won't be coming.

 

I've found to be the opposite.
I've found males to be better PM's.
Though that may be purely coincidental.

The best PM's are those who actually want a PM as a career and aren't using it as a stepping stone towards sales.

 

Having multiple perspectives has been really useful. Some agents are certified builders, others have a strong history/experience dealing with strata, and others have a knack of staying up to date with infrastructure and local area planning. Different backgrounds, different quirks I can reach out to for a quick chat.

Whenever I have a problem scenario related to one IP, I reach out to all my other PMs for their perspective. Same goes for when friends or colleagues need specialised advice, it goes to my mini panel of property pros. That itself is worth an extra few hundred bucks a year in education and problem-solving.

 

Interesting. I had thought getting the keys for the agent to organise private inspections was only possible with the agent partnered the developer building the OTP? Is this something any agency can get prior to settlement. Won't be buying many more OTP but it's good to know.

Imprecise wording on my side. I mean tenants who pass all the checks but who may be looking to move after 3-6 months (avoiding Xmas) at a competitive rent level. The idea is that on the next lease I won't be competing with hundreds of other identical units.

 

In my experience, I have found that most agencies have mainly women in their rental departments. Hence, we are 'forced' to choose female. In that case, I steer towards the 25+ PMs. Agencies have never given me a discount for an inexperienced PM.

We did have a male PM once, from memory. He was incompetent so we sacked him. We went to the agency just down the road; it had a team of mature women. Still with them today, more than 10 years later.

Totally agree.

 

Quick date on this: I've used the advice and points to get a deal to shift a group of nearby IPs to their agency for a lower rate, and 50% off the lease renewal fee. Unforto reletting fee is still a week + GST, which is a possible conflict of interest come lease renewal time... but we'll see.

There may be cons to outweight the dollars saved, but a point was made that an agent will likely put in extra care and attention if doing poorly means losing multiple IPs and the future commissions from handling the sale.

Really appreciate all the advice and different viewpoints from this thread

 

I've got 5 IPs (6 tenancies) with @Ricky Adelaide from Real People Real Estate, and he is fantastic. Why would I want to split these properties up and give them to a bunch of different PMs?
All up, I've only got 10 IPs, but only three PMs (two self managed IPs though), I wouldn't be able to remember any more names than that.

 

That seems like a great setup. Having a range of agents handling helped me see how different agents operate, different approaches to problems. However I feel Ive seen enough to bundle the business with the one agent team thatll take care of things, and save a few grand each year if all goes well year to year.