Category: Finance, Real Estate.
Along with a strong work ethic and a lot of patience, the most important trait for a landlord is organization. The danger of disorganization goes beyond losing time- you might even lose an important document and get yourself into real trouble.
You have a tremendous amount of detail to keep track of and you never know when you ll need any particular piece of paper or record. Here s a cautionary tale that will make my point clear. The only trouble was, he couldn t find his copy of the tenant s lease! I knew a landlord who needed to evict a tenant. He didn t remember exactly what the lease terms were and certainly didn t have the tenant s signature on a document that spelled out the house rules. It s easy to imagine what this landlord risked. With no other options left, this landlord did something dangerous, unethical and even illegal- he entered the tenant s apartment, poked around until he found the tenant s copy of the lease, made a copy, ran out for himself, and snuck the tenant s copy back in.
If the tenant found out, he could have had the landlord arrested. By using, a system of, and sticking with organizing his records, the landlord could have avoided all this. Even if the tenant didn t press criminal charges, a housing court judge would certainly have dismissed any eviction complaint. I recommend using property management software to keep all of your records organized. The most important part of my system is the landlord software. At the same time, you should have a paper filing system so that original documents are available when you need them.
It keeps all of your documents organized automatically by tenant, building and owner. When you go to a tenant record, you can click on tabs to see the tenant s rent status, maintenance issues, incidents, lease document and so on. This means that you can find everything related to one tenant, by simply searching, for example on that tenant. Of course, you have to enter this information into the rental property program, which does take a little time. Also, landlord software is getting better all the time. However, that s nothing compared to the amount of time you save by having all of your records accessible any time you need them. You can now import some information from other sources, like Microsoft Outlook email, to reduce my overall workload.
It would be great if we never had to deal with paper documents. The other part of my organization is the paper filing system, which should be designed to match the computer system as closely as possible. Unfortunately, legal authorities just won t take our word for it that a lease document on our computers is exactly what the tenant signed. Because my computer organization is excellent, I almost never need to get anything from my paper filing system. If we ever get audited, the IRS will want to see our actual bills, not what we recorded on the computer. The only way I would ever need anything from there would be if some third party, needed an original, like my lawyer copy of a document. My system starts with the premise that I will save every document I get or send out regarding my landlord business.
It s much more likely that I will just need some fact- how much was that utility bill? - that doesn t require an original. I may not have time to file documents whenever I get them, so I have a" holding cell" where I put documents before I file them. I put my receipts, bills and what have you in there as soon as I get them. My holding cell is a cubby on my desk. This is usually at least once per day. I never put anything related to landlording anywhere else, and whenever I take anything out of there, I immediately record it in the landlord software, then put it in the proper place in my paper filing system.
I never put anything not related to landlording in there. At least once per week, I go through the" holding cell" and file each document. For example, I have one divider for each tenant. The system is a series of folders inside larger dividers. Within the divider are folders for photos, the lease, the rental application, any correspondence, and written summaries of any incidents that took place at the tenant s apartment. This system requires a lot of file folders and dividers, as well as a fairly large file cabinet.
Those tenant dividers go inside a larger section for each property, which also has dividers for( for example) bills from different contractors. It s not really portable and that s on purpose. On the very rare occasions when I take something out, I would prefer to photocopy it, give the copy to whoever needs it, and stick the original right back in the files, where it belongs. I feel like every time I take a document out of my office, I might lose it. On the other hand, my property management software is portable. That means I can get to my important records from almost anywhere.
It runs on the Internet and I can access it from my laptop, or any other web- connected computer. And, if I need an original paper document, I can get it in a day or two without much searching or aggravation. The convenience of my property management software lets me spend time on more important and fun jobs. For example, I can pull up a bill from my electrician and confirm that payment was issued, all within my software. Making my properties more profitable, and finding new and promising deals. With my online rental property software, that s not necessary. The last step, would be a, of course backup schedule for my data.
Because it s hosted on a web server with constant backups. I know that whenever I need some crucial fact, I can open up my laptop, and it ll be right there in front of me.
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