5 Tips for Renting Out a Property

Renting out a property is a great way to earn extra income. Independent landlords make up around 55% of the market. The most common type of rental property are single-family homes, followed closely by duplexes and condos.

Renting out a property is a great way to earn extra income. Independent landlords make up around 55% of the market. The most common type of rental property are single-family homes, followed closely by duplexes and condos.

Find Tenants Fast

Less than 1% of our homes were vacant in 2021.

However, you will have to work for that profit. Renting out a house is time-consuming, especially managing the rental itself and finding and screening tenants. Property damage is always a lingering threat from unknown tenants. Landlords can spend anywhere between 2-11 hours on tasks related to their rental.

This article will take a look at tips to help you prepare a property for rent and save you on time and money.

How to Rent out a House

There’s a lot that goes into renting a house. These five tips will help get you started on the basics:

Make a Financial Plan

You need planning and excellent long-term thinking if you want to manage a rental house. You want to be sure that the time and effort of becoming a landlord will be profitable in your local housing market. Investing in rental properties isn’t a get-rich-quick route. Instead, it’s a long-term investment.

While making a financial plan, consider these expenses:

  • Property taxes
  • Insurance
  • Maintenance
  • Rental rate
  • Mortgage payment

Create a Property Management Plan

The plan you make needs to directly correlate with who you want to be dealing with daily maintenance issues.

  • Who should your future renters call if there’s a burst pipe in the house?
  • Who will fix it?

If you live nearby, it could be you. If you plan to move out of town, or don’t have DIY know-how, you’ll need a professional.

Decide who you want to manage the property day-to-day. You need to have plans in place for repairs and planned maintenance tasks. One consideration to make is whether you would like to contract with a property management company.

Draw Up Rental Policies and a Lease

While you can find basic lease contracts online, there are specific issues you’ll need to personalize. Do you intend to allow pets? Will you want a pet deposit, if so? Who does lawn care? What’s the fee for a tenant if they want to end their lease early?

Whatever you decide on, you need to make sure that everything within the lease agreement is legal. That leads to our next point.

Learn Landlord-Tenant Law

Almost every state has specific landlord-tenant laws. These laws cover a wide range of issues, from security deposits to property access. Renters have rights too that must be followed. For example, you’ll need to know the required time frame for notifying a renter that you’ll be doing a spot-check of the property.

Screen Potential Tenants

Once you have everything else in place, you can finally move on to finding the ideal tenant. You’ll want to be sure to run a background and credit check on any candidate. Typically, this process looks like:

  • They fill out an application.
  • You get their social security number and run a credit check.
  • You receive at least three references for them.
  • You confirm their employment.

Get Help With Your Property Management

Managing a rental property can feel like an overwhelming task. Red Wagon Properties can help alleviate the stress and workload involved. We can be your landlord, advocate, and manage all aspects of the tenant relationship.

Some of the tasks we handle include:

  • preparing your property
  • finding and screening tenants
  • filing paperwork
  • handling legal matters
  • taking care of maintenance issues

When you let Red Wagon Properties handle your property in the San Antonio area, you’ll experience a low-vacancy rate and brief time on the market.

Contact us today to enlist the help of the #1 San Antonio property management company around.

Red Wagon Properties FAQ

Below are answers to some of the most commonly asked questions to help you with your decision-making process.

Feel free to reach out to us if you have any questions or concerns not addressed here.

Who Are We?

Red Wagon Properties is a property management company in the San Antonio area. We handle preparing properties and finding tenants. When you work with Red Wagon, you don’t have to worry about the mundane day-to-day tasks involved with managing a rental property. We strive to take the stress out of the equation so that you can instead focus on growing your investment and living your life.

What Do We Do?

There are a lot of tasks involved in making a property ready for rent. Then, finding and screening tenants is another lengthy process. After that, it becomes a routine of addressing repair problems and other miscellaneous tasks. The work never ends.

Instead of worrying over all this personally, Red Wagon handles it all for you. When you decide to work with us, we take care of advertising the property for you. None of our properties sit vacant for long. We want to drive high tenant traffic to your property so you can start earning money fast.

Some of the locations we list your property include:

  • RedWagonProperties.com
  • Realtor.com
  • MySA.com
  • Homes.mil
  • craigslist.com
  • Yahoo.com

Aside from these listed sites, there are over 30 other affiliate internet sites we’ll advertise your property on. Most importantly, when you work with Red Wagon, you’ll be able to have your rental listed on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS). Our licensed real estate agents will act as your leasing agents.

Make sure to read our Complete Guide to Rental Property Investment

Why Choose Us?

If the thought of trying to handle a rental property all by yourself is enough to give you a headache, know that you don’t have to handle things alone. Most people invest in rental properties because they want to build their retirement and earn passive income.

Make sure to read our Complete Guide to Rental Property Investment If you are considering investing in rental properties.

Being a landlord shouldn’t become a full-time job that makes you regret being your own boss.

Red Wagon Properties offers a team of experienced real estate professionals who will work together to ensure your property operates smoothly and profitably. You won’t have to waste time chasing down rent anymore. Red Wagon handles this for you. If you want, we can even arrange for rent to deposit directly into your bank account!

People in San Antonio rely on Red Wagon Properties because we have an exemplary marketing strategy. Have you ever seen a rental house sit empty for months at a time, languishing and not earning the landlord money? Our properties have a low vacancy rate because we know how and where to advertise to drive tenant traffic.

Do you live in a different state than your rental property and can’t check in on its current state? No problem. At Red Wagon, we’ll keep an eye on the condition of your rental property. We schedule regular inspections to ensure the interior and exterior remain in good shape.

Finally, if you’ve ever heard the horror stories about evicting reluctant tenants, know that we handle even this! In the rare case that a tenant must be evicted for late payments or another issue, we have an experienced team that knows how the eviction process works and knows what to do to take care of the problem fast and offer you guidance.

Find professional help and local expertise from our powerful Real Estate team.