X
X
Where did you hear about us?
The monthly magazine providing news analysis and professional research for the discerning private investor/landlord

The 'Secrets' to Running a Letting Agency - Part 2

When a landlord chooses to use a letting agent, from the outset, generally the only thing they are looking for is a good tenant. Many see our primary role as providing a tenant and most landlords do not examine what goes on beyond finding a tenant and being charged fees. However, if you look at our job in context, we probably spend, two weeks marketing the property to find a tenant and then spend on average 18 months managing it. Also, of the staff that we employ it is approximately a one third to two third ratio in favour of the management and accounts teams, therefore we have more staff managing the properties than we do letting them.

At the outset, landlords will select an agent who they believe can let their property the fastest, so it is important to have this part of the process set up well, have good marketing of your properties, strong photos and descriptions, great contact with large local employers and a steady feed of tenants from your selected online property portal and marketing. It is also important to be knowledgeable about the rental valuation and offer guidance on how to present the property to maximise its potential. This will help the agent win the landlords business in the first place, but what makes him stay with you?

Loyalty in the lettings business is where most agents fail; they all seem to focus on the front end marketing, leaving the team to deal with any bits of maintenance that come through yet these same staff are paid to let properties, so they are not particularly interested in fixing toilets that dont work.

If the back end management of a property has no structure; if there is no team to deal specifically with these tasks (separate to the Lettings team), then it will almost certainly cause disappointment for the landlord and tenant down the line, as their issues will not have the focus they want, with the likelihood of them moving to another supplier through disappointment.

Want the full article?

subscribe