Need a better Rental Agent. Western Sydney.

Can anyone please recommend a quality rental manager for the South Penrith area?

I keep thinking my current one will redeem themselves but just keeps going from bad to worse.

Thanks!

 

@Hayley Cannon

 

Another vote for @Hayley Cannon at Peachey Estate Agents!

 

Lol one more for Hayley - Peachey Estate Agents

 

Another for @Hayley Cannon

 

I have no issues with my PM now. But, just looking at the upvotes @Hayley Cannon , I am wondering if I should move my IPs to peachey.

 

What I love about small agents like @Hayley Cannon is that they run their own show. They are not a pawn for the larger agencies, where they change their overworked PMs constantly. They have a smaller clientele & the buck stops at them.

For instance, this is the service I was receiving from my previously great agent. We had a vacant property & got them to re-advertise it. They had booked the opens on a Saturday afternoon, when all other agencies books in the morning. We phoned and said that we required them to be in the mornings, and were told that they would change it. The next week there was no open at all for it. When we asked why they said that as we'd already had a couple of Saturday listings, they would now do an open during the week instead & we could never have Saturday mornings as the PM is too busy????? WTF? Turns out they only do 2 Saturday opens in that area, and only in the afternoons because the morning ones get done in a different area. They have ONE, that's right, only ONE PM doing open for inspections on the weekend for over 1000 properties.

You don't realise what's happening until something goes wrong, especially when you have long term tenants.

 

Which agent are you with currently? I interviewed a few last year and I decided that I stay with the old one

 

I tend to agree. But small agencies also have issues their own. If the owner/founder somehow get sloppy or distracted, the quality of their services suffer a lot. This happened to one of my IP

 

Not saying that it can't happen, but it's less likely to happen, as it's their business. They screw up & they hurt themselves. I'm not sure how many PM's you've had, but over my lifetime I've had a LOT of them because I've bought a LOT of properties in NSW, QLD, VIC and SA. Hands down, the service has been much better with a small independent agent.

 

Even if the vacancy rate is only 2%, that's still 20 properties that they need to attend, airing, open, lock up again. Ain't gonna happen.

Hint - If inspection is by appointment only, it may be due to an overloaded PM who will be focussing on keeping all of the plates spinning.

 

Luckily and unluckily, it happened once. It was a shxtshow if I have to be polite.

BTW, do you meet PMs in person first before soliciting their services or just through the phone interview?

 

We've been using Basil Nahas' team at Liang & Simmonds Mt Druitt. They've been really good. When we were buying properties remotely, Basil would even go and inspect them for us.

 

As soon as I found out, I was outta there. This agency was awesome at first & I referred many people to them, but service had been slipping recently. New agent & I’m happy once again.

 

Depends! Some you just get a ‘feel’ for. Plus, we’ve got properties that we’ve bought sight unseen, so not about to personally interview an agent.

 

Basil is pretty cool. Can’t comment on the PM side of things, but have dealt with him several times.

 

I suggest doing it yourself as the Residential Tenancies Act is a pretty simple piece of legislation.

I started self managing my property last year and haven’t looked back since. We now save $30-40/week in property management fees and spend an extra 5mins a week managing the property when we issue a receipt for rent received.

 

Sometimes self managing is a great option for some landlords however if you end up with a difficult tenant or an outright bad one the hassle isn't worth the money you are saving. I know with my personal investment property I prefer to have a friend be the point of contact as you tend to be more emotionally invested and roped into completing unnecessary requests because the tenants sometimes feel like you are a friend and should be doing xy and z for them.

Management fees are also tax deductible and you may be able to claim a small return on them making your "actual" expense less.

 

You’re a property manager, right? Self interest.

I don’t have any issues setting boundaries with friends or tenants. I’ve actually found since I started self-managing the repair requests have dropped off dramatically... and when they do come in, it’s much easier to discuss and negotiate with the tenant than going through a third party.

I’ve been to NCAT several times, I would not want those property managers representing the landlords to represent me. And for those property managers, I was probably that “difficult tenant” you describe, but they still lost... and the owner has to pay for the property manager’s time on top. What a laugh!

I do not see the point in incurring an expense simply to get a deduction and receive circa ~30% of my expense back. I’d rather have all the money in my own pocket, or inject it into my property.

 

Well, I am NOT a property manager. I've many properties, and been in the game for a long, long time, being retired, I've got the time on my hands to do it, and I'm telling you now, that the cost saving of DIY is not worth the effort. Oh, yes, it's all well & good when you've got a great tenant, and all you're doing is collecting rent. But there is a lot more to it than that. Mind you, there are some dreadful PM's around, so you need to be on the lookout for the good ones.