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3 Ways That Turnkey Rentals Save You Time

Of all the resources you have, time is the most valuable. It’s the one resource that is absolutely finite. And, it’s the one resource that everyone has equal amounts of on a day-to-day basis. While you can edge ahead of the competition by acquiring more money or more knowledge, you can never gain more time than anyone else. However, what you cando is to gain more free time. You can then use that extra free time to do what you want, including making more money, learning, spending cherished time with family or anything else. As an investment asset, there’s nothing better than turnkey rentals for saving you time. Turnkey rentals save you time in many ways.

 

Turnkey Rentals Are a Form of Passive Income

 

You’ve probably heard a lot about the benefits of passive income. Passive income streams generate money without requiring your constant involvement. Passive income affords you the freedom to spend your time the way you want to instead of the way you have to. Turnkey rentals are a form of passive income as long as you retain the services of a property manager. You purchase the turnkey rental and your property manager takes care of the property and helps ensure you receive monthly rental income. This is one way that turnkey rentals save you time.

 

Turnkey Rentals Pay You Indefinitely

 

When you invest in turnkey rentals, you don’t need to keep searching for more ways to make money over and over again. By contrast, when you invest in the stock market you have to keep looking for the next big stock pick. The research needed to choose stocks is labor—and time—intensive. However, with turnkey rentals, you do your research once and then the property cash flows for you over and over throughout the years when or if you ever decide to sell.

 

Turnkey Rentals Are Easy To Shop For

 

When you work with a trusted turnkey rental company like MartelTurnkey, you have access to turnkey rental inventory in some of the best markets in the country. When you’re ready to make your next turnkey rental purchase, all you have to do is go online, check for turnkey rentals for sale, and choose your property. This is in stark contrast to the job of picking stocks, searching for your own rental properties or investing in most other asset types. Turnkey rentals save you more time when you go to invest in your future properties by being easily accessible.

 

No matter where you are in your real estate investing journey, turnkey rentals save you time so you can spend that extra free time doing something else. When you’re ready to invest in turnkey rentals, we hope you’ll choose to work with us, MartelTurnkey. Contact MartelTurnkey today to schedule a call or browse available turnkey rentals online right now.

 

 

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How to Find the Best Property Management Company

Whether you’re investing in a turnkey rental property with a property management company already in place or you’re searching for your own property management company, you only want to work with the best. The property management company will essentially be your investment partner. As with all things investment related, you want to ensure that your partners are trustworthy, competent, loyal and responsible. Those are attributes not easy to find with just a casual search. In a recent podcast episode of A Millennial’s Guide to Real Estate Investing, we sat down with one of our favorite property managers, Salvatore Friscia, founder of two very successful property management companies in San Diego. We wanted to find out from a property management company’s perspective how to find the best property management company. Here’s what we discovered:

 

Realize That Your Property Manager is a Key Part of Your Team

 

Newer investors often don’t foresee how much value a good property management company can add.  The very first step in finding the best property management company is to realize that they’re going to play an important role in your investment strategy. Says Salvatore Friscia, “You don’t see a lot of real estate investors acknowledge that a strong property manager’s an integral part of their team.”

 

Don’t Focus on the Cost

 

While it’s natural to ask about the cost of hiring a property management company, it’s not one of the first questions you should ask, advises Salvatore. “You know, the number one question that most people ask, sometimes even before we can say, thank you for calling, is how much do you charge? But the true question, the more valuablequestion would be to ask, what type of valuedo you provide for your services. Forget the cost for a moment because you may not be comparing apples with apples.” It’s true. In San Diego, for example, where Salvatore works, the industry standard for property management companies ranges between 6% and 10%. That’s a wide range. As Salvatore puts it, “If you’re comparing somebody and you want to know if they’re at 6% or 8%, you may not be getting full property management as opposed to just a la carte service. A better question is to ask what value they’re providing for their management fee.”

 

The Number of Managed Properties is a Little Irrelevant

 

One of the most frequently asked questions of property management companies is, how many properties do you manage? While that sounds like a valid question that unearths their level of experience, it’s not a great question, says Salvatore. “The truth is, it’s just not realistic,“ he says. “From my experience, I’ve seen companies that manage 50 properties suck and I’ve seen companies that managed 5,000 properties that suck. It’s not a matter of how many properties you manage that’s gonna make a difference.” According to Salvatore, “A better question is to ask what properties in the immediate area do you have under management? That gives you a better feel for their understanding of your property type and the surroundings.”

 

Older Isn’t Necessarily Better

 

“It used to be a badge of honor to say we’ve been in business 30 or 40 years,” says Salvatore. “So, you know, you hear a lot of people say, well we’ve been doing this for 30 years or 40 years, you know, that may not be the best thing for you. In the last five years we have really changed the industry in terms of automation, technology and social media. These things have really changed the way property management companies are handling assets.” What Salvatore is saying is simply, older isn’t necessarily better when it comes to finding the best property management company. Experience is still critical. But the right kindof experience is more crucial than the amountof experience, since the advent of technology. You want to hire a property management company that is savvy about social media, automation and the entire digital world. Why? Because that’s the world your tenants live in. Also because these are the times when you need automated reporting, online tenant portals and landlord portals. “So you want, in a way, companies that have been around for maybe four or five years that might have the upper hand nowadays on what’s necessary, what they can offer you in terms of their workflow and their systems; that they can offer you to help out property management and communication,” says Salvatore.

 

Choose Someone You’re Comfortable With

 

It’s helpful to spend a certain amount of time with the property manager to see what kind of vibe you get; who you can talk easily with and feel like you could have a good relationship with. Whether it’s a long Skype or a lunch, it’s important to spend some time so you can kind of evaluate the energy. As Salvatore says, “You want to definitely have somebody who you can relate to and understands your goals and what you’re trying to aspire to do.”

 

You Have to Look at Online Reviews

 

Online reviews are a strong indicator of the track record of a property management company. “You’ve got to look at reviews,” says Salvatore. You’ve got to look online. One of the questions I would recommend to ask a property manager is, what’s your online rating? If they don’t know immediately with their online rating is, they’re not paying attention. It’s important for me to put the measures in place as a business owner to make sure that we’re providing the right service that brings in those five star reviews. So if you ask the property manager, what’s your online rating? And they stumble, they don’t have a clue, that’s a red flag. That’s somebody who’s not aware that Google, Yelp, and Facebook have the power over people in their decision making factor.”

 

Ensure They Understand the Importance of Marketing

 

The best property management companies know that marketing is important to your success and their success. For example, it’s the difference between online photos on Zillow taken from a car with the outline of the window in the property photos and professional photos that entice tenants to send in applications without even seeing the place in person. “So going out there and paying, you know, $50 or whatever for a professional photographer to go out there and take eight to ten pictures of that property now puts you above your competition,” says Salvatore. “And that’s the kind of stuff that definitely you’d want to look for.”

 

A good property management company can make a huge difference in the success of your rental property. As you can see, there are a lot of questions you should be asking of any property management company you’re considering. For more tips on how to find the best property management company, and to listen to this entire podcast episode on A Millennial’s Guide to Real Estate Investing, please click here.

 

 

 

 

 

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All Your Fears About Being a Landlord Addressed

Have you thought about owning rental property, but you’re nervous about being a landlord?  Sometimes lack of money and opportunity aren’t what keeps people from investing in buy and hold real estate. Sometimes people are just downright afraid to be a landlord. But fear shouldn’t stand in your way of doing anything in life, let alone being a landlord. Following are the most commonly cited fears about owning rental property, with solutions that will hopefully make you rethink your beliefs about what the landlord experience is really like.

 

Not Having the Right Personality

 

You may feel apprehensive about being a landlord if you think you don’t have the right personality for it. If you’re a natural worrier or tend to assume the worst in every situation, you may envision a future of sleepless nights and chronic stress.

 

You shouldn’t need to make massive changes to your personality in order to make money from real estate rental investing. But it does help to reflect on the underlying causes of your worrying. Studies have shown that people who worry about things that haven’t yet happened often do so because of fear of the unknown. Learning more about how real estate investing actually works—and specifically about the unique benefits of turnkey rentals—may help to alleviate your fears.

 

Being Sued

 

Perhaps the biggest fear that people have about being a landlord is being sued. You may be imagining all kinds of horrible scenarios ranging from paying out of pocket for someone else’s misfortune, or ending up penniless due to a huge lawsuit claim.

 

If you’re already a homeowner, you know that you could be held liable for injuries and accidents that occur on your property. That’s why you carry homeowner’s insurance. If you get a third party claim from someone who’s injured on your property, the liability coverage of your homeowner’s policy will usually kick in – if the injury was caused by negligence on your part. The same holds true for your rental property. You’ll be carrying property insurance as well as some other insurance specific to rental property ownership. This insurance coverage is designed to protect you and your assets in the event of a claim.

 

Lacking the Proper Skillset

 

When many people think of what it would be like to be a landlord, they picture themselves wearing a tool belt, hunched over a broken something or other, trying to look like they know what they’re doing.

 

While some landlords do try to “play handyman,” it’s safe to say that most landlords are very willing to let the experts be the fix-it men. This is especially the case when you buy and out-of-state rental property. When you buy a turnkey rental from MartelTurnkey, your out-of-state rental repairs and maintenance are taken care of by your property manager. So you can leave the tool belt at home and rest easy knowing that no handyman skills are necessary to be a landlord.

 

Losing Money

 

Another big fear that people have about owning rental property is losing money. What if the tenant stops paying rent or simply vacates the property in the middle of the night? What if you can’t pay your mortgage on the rental, or the whole real estate market comes crashing down?

 

As far as investments go, real estate is a very safe bet. Rental property in particular is considered a very low risk investment. Unlike stock, the value of real estate never goes to zero. Technically, even if your rental property burned down to the ground, you’d be reimbursed by your insurance company, plus you’d still own the land to rebuild. Now, things do happen with real estate just like anything else, but there are always ways to handle any situation that arises. If your tenant stops paying rent, your property manager can begin eviction proceedings. This ensures that you can get a new, paying tenant in as soon as possible. The same thing happens if the tenant vacates in the middle of a lease term. As far as not being able to cover the mortgage, you could buy what’s called “rent loss insurance” that’s designed to cover just such scenarios for landlords. You could also just make a practice of keeping the equivalent of at least one mortgage payment in reserve, to cover yourself in this event.

 

Messing Things Up Out of Ignorance

 

Personal ignorance also plays into people’s fear about owning a rental property. What if you buy a bad piece of property or you pay too much for it? What if you mismanage it and you lose your investment due to not knowing what you’re doing?

 

If you’re fairly uneducated about real estate, then by all means you should learn more before buying a rental property if you plan to do it all by yourself. Not understanding where to buy, how to choose a rental property or how to manage it can indeed lead to massive loss. However that’s why buying turnkey rentals from MartelTurnkey is a smart strategy; particularly for investors who don’t know or don’t have the time to learn all the nitty gritty about investing in real estate. When you buy from MartelTurnkey, you know that the property was bought in the right place at the right time, for the right price. Your rental property cash flows from day one, giving you the peace of mind of knowing you made a wise investment.

 

Lacking the Funds to Maintain It

 

Another common fear is lacking sufficient funds. Suppose you can’t maintain the rental property? You’re probably already aware that homeownership requires regular maintenance and upkeep. What if your rental needs something major and you can’t afford to repair or replace it?

 

There are definitely repairs and maintenance costs associated with owning any kind of real estate, including rental property. But again, buying turnkey rentals through MartelTurnkey offers advantages in this area, too. First of all, when we seek properties to buy, we give preference to homes with solid roofs and HVAC systems. This helps to ensure that we get good value when we do purchase, so we can ultimately pass on savings to our investors. Second, we do a full rehab on all the properties we buy. This includes taking care of the major repairs and replacements as well as the smaller details like trim and painting. So when you take possession of a MartelTurnkey rental property, it will be in the best possible condition. Over time, repairs and maintenance costs will come up. We recommend that you keep a few months of rental income on reserve, in an account that is easily liquidated, to take care of these expenses.

 

Has fear been keeping you from being a landlord? If so, you’ve been missing out on one of the most effective wealth-building strategies that exists today. Hopefully this article has addressed your biggest concerns about being a landlord and you feel more comfortable with the idea. If you have any other questions, or would like further information about the benefits of MartelTurnkey rental properties, please contact us today.

 

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Good Credit is Essential For Real Estate Investment Success

For recent college graduates, it can be more of a challenge to get the funding to invest in your first real estate property. You may not have two years of W-2 income to show financial stability, or you may not have a sufficiently robust credit history to demonstrate fiscal responsibility. Whether you’re a recent college grad or a seasoned working professional, your credit report always plays an integral role in the success of your real estate investment future. Conventional lenders will always want to see a strong credit score and history, and you can’t take advantage of any of it without building and maintaining good credit.

 

How to Build Good Credit

 

If you’re a recent college graduate, you’re lucky. You haven’t had much time to irreparably mess up your credit. For most grads, it’s a matter of building credit history and then maintaining good status. To build credit, consider taking out a credit card in your own name instead of just being an authorized user on your parents’ credit card. Being an authorized user can help restore bad credit, but it doesn’t do much to build your own credit history.

 

Another way to build credit is to get a car loan. Although the optimal situation is not to have a car payment at all, if you have zero credit history, a car loan can help get you on the map. Avoid the temptation to get the most expensive car that you’re approved for. You’re probably looking at five years of payments. That $400 monthly payment (or whatever it is) will really cut into your available investment money over time. A modest car loan, with monthly payments made on time, will help your credit just as much as a hefty car loan.

 

If you’ve been paying monthly rent while at college, you can use that history to help build your credit. There are third party companies you can pay for that will report your timely rent payments to the three credit reporting agencies. Assuming all your rent payments have been on time, this can boost your credit rating and enhance your credit report.

 

Make credit card payments on time or early if possible. Beware of bill pay services offered by your bank. These are convenient, but the payments take longer to arrive and they could inadvertently make your payment late even though you authorized the payment several days in advance. If you enroll in paperless billing, make sure to designate your credit card company as a safe sender, and don’t ignore emails from them.

 

How to Protect Your Good Credit

 

If you already have decent credit, take steps to protect it. Continue making all payments on time. Once a year, obtain a free copy of your credit report from the three major credit agencies. Go through and make sure all the information is accurate. If you find something that’s not right, follow the credit agency’s guidelines for reporting errors. They’ll correct any errors, but you should still follow up to make sure it’s been taken care of.

 

Consider enrolling in a credit protection plan that helps prevent identity theft. The better your credit is, the more likely that a hacker could try to take out loans with your information. You should consider either paying for a monitoring service or make sure you monitor your credit activity yourself.

 

Learn How to Budget and Manage Finances

 

It’s reasonable to assume that unless you were a finance major, your knowledge about handling money is pretty sparse. If you’re really going to be investing in real estate you’ll need to learn how to budget money, how to manage finances and more. Don’t leave anything to chance when it comes to your money. Take the time to really educate yourself about budgeting and financing especially when it comes to real estate investing. There are a lot of moving parts, and you have to get a handle on everything in order to be successful.

 

Some ways to learn what you need to know are to read books, take online courses, attend networking events and think about getting a mentor. Even though you’ve recently graduated, your education concerning real estate investing is just beginning. There’s a lot to know, and it’s up to you to get the answers you need.

 

If you take your credit seriously and do all these things, you should have no problem getting funding when you’re eventually ready to invest in your first real estate property. As you become more experienced, continue to use credit wisely and make payments as agreed. This will ensure a solid credit history for a lifetime, which will support your future real estate investment ventures. At MartelTurnkey, we’re always happy to help qualified buyers obtain financing. Please give us a call when you’re ready to invest!

 

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Stock Market vs. Real Estate

Which is the better investment – the stock market or real estate? There are arguments for both sides. But when you have a limited amount of money to invest, as most people do, your decision carries more weight. Your stock broker (the one who gets the commissions) will undoubtedly advise you to invest in the stock market. But before you sign over all your money, consider real estate investing and all the ways it benefits you compared to the stock market. When you need to choose between the two, we believe that the wise choice is to invest in real estate first. Real estate investing pays out in so many more ways than the stock market.

 

Leverage Financing


Real estate is the only investment vehicle that enables you to buy an asset worth five times the initial cash investment. With certain financing, you can buy a property with as little as $16,000 or just 20% down. You can’t do that with stocks. In the stock market, you pay exactly what the stock is worth at that instant you buy it. Then you have to hope that the stock goes up in order to make any money. In real estate, it’s even possible to make money the day you buy, if you get it for less than its appraised value.

 

Always Valuable


Real estate is always valuable on some level; even when the real estate market drops, your real estate investment is always going to be worth something. However, with stocks it’s a different story. Stock prices can drop to zero, and they do so. In the stock market, it’s possible to lose every penny you’ve invested. With real estate, your investment property is always valuable. It can never ever go to zero.

 

Cash Flow


Buy and hold real estate like turnkey rental properties offer continual cash flow. Every month your rental tenant pays rent that’s money in the bank. With stocks, there’s no continual cash flow unless you happen to find a stock that pays dividends. Even so, it’s highly unlikely you’ll find a stock that pays you up to 15% returns like real estate investments can.

 

Tangible Asset


Investment real estate is a tangible asset. It’s something you can touch and feel and see. Stocks are just an asset on paper. You don’t actually own anything except a share of a nameless, faceless company that you have nothing to do with; no connection with.

 

More Control Over Your Investment


Real estate is a tangible asset. You can control and improve your real estate holdings. You can make improvements to the property on a structural level or a cosmetic level. You can make it physically more valuable by adding to it or improving upon it. You have complete control over your investment. With stocks, you have no control over your investment. The value of the stock is based on public opinion. If public opinion sways in one direction or another, the value of your portfolio goes up or down accordingly. With stocks, your financial net worth is essentially in the hands of whim and fate.

 

More Ways to Make Money

 

Real estate provides you with multiple ways to make and save money. You can make money from rental income, save money on taxes with deductions, make money on appreciation, make money with earned equity and more. Stocks don’t offer you any way to make money unless you get rid of them by selling them. Sure, you might have a stock or two that pays dividends, but that’s a pittance compared to the money that you can earn from real estate investments.

 

One Investment For a Lifetime


With real estate, you invest in buy and hold property and it pays you about a 15% return over a lifetime. That’s passive income that doesn’t require more work after you’ve done your original due diligence. With the stock market, you expend time and energy again and again to find stocks that you think will increase over time. Even if you’re “successful,” you don’t make anything unless you sell, at which point you have to pay capital gains tax plus spend more time and energy to find yet another good investment.

 

Tax Advantages


With real estate you get to write off related expenses like repairs, maintenance, marketing, property management and interest, among other things. You can use those write-offs to offset your taxes from your real estate rental income and your W-2 earnings. There are no write offs with stocks. All you get is more taxes to pay both when you earn dividends from your stocks and when you sell your stocks.

You can certainly invest in both the stock market and in real estate. But you can expect to get far greater returns from your real estate investments, as you can see

 

 

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Why You Should Diversify Your Investment Portfolio With Real Estate

Every investment advisor will tell you that diversification is of the utmost importance in your investment portfolio. Diversification helps you to reduce risk exposure, maximize gains in any economic climate and minimize losses. No matter how much you have to invest, it’s wise to spread it out among a variety of asset types. What financial advisors sometimes forget to mention is that real estate is one of the most stable and reliable ways to diversify. Real estate investments may not pay commissions to your broker like stocks and mutual funds do, but they can pay off big in your investment portfolio.

 

Real Estate is a Smart Hedge Against Inflation

 

The current inflation rate is 2%, which is better than the 3% we’ve seen in previous years. Still, inflation is always something to worry about, since it means your money doesn’t go as far as it used to. When you put your money in the stock market or other exchanges, it’s spent. From that moment on, you have to hope that your picks will outpace the rate of inflation.

 

Real estate—and in particular turnkey rentals—are a smart hedge against inflation. When you buy and hold real estate, you can almost be guaranteed of a few things: 1) your property is likely to appreciate in value over time; 2) whenever the local economy improves you can raise the rent, thereby increasing your cash flow; 3) if you decide to sell when the market’s high, you can realize gains that match current market conditions; and 4) when your property increases in value you can do a cash out refinance for the equity.

 

You Have More Control With Real Estate

 

Stock prices can dip or rise based on the news of the day. If a CEO makes headlines for bad behavior, you can count on your stock in that company losing value. If civil war breaks out in a tiny corner of South America, your currency holdings will react accordingly. There’s no control over your portfolio apart from the moment you buy or sell.

 

When you buy rental properties, you have all the control. You control where you buy and how much you pay, but you also have control over any upgrades you want to do, which property manager to use, how much you charge for rent, when to spend money on repairs, when to hold off, and everything related to your property. Rental property ownership is perfect for anyone who is tired of having the entirety of their portfolio being at the mercy of faceless corporations on the stock exchanges.

 

Real Estate Is Less Volatile Than Other Investments

 

Stocks, commodities, currency and similar investments carry inherent volatility. Prices rise and fall by the second, and the value of your portfolio is inextricably tied to the whims of the market makers. When you wake up your net worth is one amount, and by midday it’s something else. Whether you’re invested in Microsoft, Exxon, gold or pork bellies, the volatility is inescapable. Many people liken investing in the stock market to gambling due to its unpredictable highs and lows.

 

When you choose to buy and hold, real estate can provide you with steady, long-term returns. With a turnkey rental investment, it’s possible to have a rock solid, reliable source of income that is almost guaranteed to perform the way you expect it to. And, since everything with real estate happens on a slower basis, you’ll always have plenty of time to plan your next moves ahead of time, rather than feel pressured to make fevered decisions about your stock buys and sells.

 

The Real Estate Market is Regional

 

The real estate market is subject to fluctuations just like any other investment market. The notable difference is that the real estate market is regional. Depending on where you look, real estate prices may be increasing, decreasing or plateauing. The market can vary dramatically among states, cities and even neighborhoods. One city, such as San Francisco, might be out of reach for someone with just a few thousand to invest; while another metro area, like Memphis, is highly affordable. With real estate, there’s always room to jump on the real estate ladder someplace.

 

Offset Taxes With Real Estate

 

Any profits you make by selling stock or from receiving dividends are usually subject to capital gains tax unless you’re operating out of a qualified retirement fund. Even then, your taxes may only be deferred. There are no tax benefits to trading stocks and similar investments like currency or commodities.

 

Real estate investments come with a bevy of tax write-offs that you can use to offset the taxes you owe from your stock gains. If you own investment real estate, such as turnkey rentals, you can write off almost all your related expenses, including property management fees, interest expenses, repairs and maintenance, travel to check on your property, marketing and more. You can also deduct the depreciation on your real estate investment, further offsetting those stock gains.

 

Are you ready to step up your game with real estate? A turnkey rental in Memphis, Cleveland, Birmingham or St. Louis can round out your investment portfolio and give you the financial security you and your family crave. Stocks and similar investments certainly have their place, but if you aren’t investing in real estate you’re missing out on something truly valuable for your portfolio. Please contact MartelTurnkey today to have all your questions answered.

 

 

 

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What to Expect From a Rental Property Manager

The turnkey rentals in Memphis and the other markets that MartelTurnkey invests in come with property management already in place when we sell to our investors. Property managers offer an array of valuable services that most landlords appreciate for their contribution to a passive income experience. As the new owner, you’re under no obligation to continue working with the same property management company that we’ve put in place, but we would highly recommend it. If you do choose to use our property manager, here are some of the services you can often expect:

 

Online Portal

 

Many property management companies offer an online website portal where you can log in and check the status of your turnkey rentals in Memphis and other cities on a 24/7 basis. Here, you can download reports, view repair tickets, see payment history, communicate with the property manager and more. This offers you a convenient way to keep tabs on everything in one place.

 

Ongoing Property Maintenance

 

The property manager takes care of routine and emergency repairs and/or replacements for your property. This can include anything from fixing a running toilet to changing out an A/C filter to replacing an overhead microwave oven. You will never be contacted directly by the tenant with these things. Instead, your tenant places a service request with your property management company, who assesses the need and then takes care of it as necessary. If the replacement or repair cost is significant, the property management company will first confer with you to determine the best way to proceed.

 

Monthly or Annual Reporting

 

The property management company provides landlords with monthly and/or annual financial reports. These reports are helpful for organizing and understanding your cash flow and tax records as a rental property owner. You’ll be able to quickly see your monthly outgoings and income to keep your finances on track. Many landlords hand off their detailed property management reports to their tax accountants at year end to ensure that every allowable deduction is taken.

 

Communication Records

 

The property management company will keep a record of communications among the tenant, the property manager, the landlord, repair persons and more. Any communication having to do with your property is carefully organized and filed. This is important because it protects your interests as the owner in the event of any discrepancy about how communication occurred. You can also use this record of communication to measure the responsiveness of your property management company to your tenant.

 

Late or Missed Rent Payments Management

 

If a tenant is late with a rent payment, your property management company will be on top of it. You’ll never have to make a phone call or send an email to your tenant asking if they’ve paid their rent. The property manager will find out what the problem is and handle it accordingly. As far as your expectations for receiving the rent into your account, your property manager will keep you apprised of the situation.

 

Evictions

 

In cases where eviction is necessary, the property management company will handle the whole process on your behalf. You won’t need to file eviction papers, deal with law enforcement or appear in court. You’ll be kept in the loop about the process, but will never have to personally be involved. The whole thing will be dealt with by your property manager.

 

Marketing

 

Your property management company takes care of all the marketing for your turnkey rentals in Memphis or elsewhere when it’s time to find a new tenant. Your property may be advertised for rent on the property management site and among many online sites. You’ll never have to take photos, write listing descriptions or answer inquires about the property. The entire marketing campaign is done by your property management company.

 

Tenant Vetting

 

The property management company also handles tenant vetting. They’ll review applications, do background checks, interview or do whatever else is necessary to ensure you get the best possible tenant for your rental property.

 

Lease Signings and Renewals

 

The property management company handles all the lease signings and lease renewals for your turnkey rental in Memphis or wherever it’s located. They’ll get the lease signed, keep track of when it’s up for renewal and have the same or a new tenant in your turnkey rental property as soon as possible.

 

Cleanings

 

When there’s a tenant turnover, your turnkey rental will have to be cleaned and readied for the next tenant. Cosmetic repairs might have to be made as well. As a landlord with a property management company in place, you’ll never have to do anything yourself. You won’t be coming in with a mop and vacuum and paintbrush. Instead, your property management company will either do all this work with in-house staff or they’ll outsource it to a trusted local company.

 

Advice and Recommendations

 

As an experienced turnkey rental manager, your property manager is a valuable resource for advice and recommendations. They are ready to assist you with making decisions about setting rent prices, when it’s time to raise rents, whether you should move to evict, whether you can wait another year to replace the roof and much more. The property manager is a font of knowledge that you can draw from whenever you like. They are familiar with the local housing market, with construction practices and with turnkey rental properties in general.

 

Legal Compliance

 

Laws regarding tenants and landlords vary from state to state. Owners of turnkey rentals in Memphis and other cities rely on local property managers to comply with the relevant laws. When you use a property manager, you can be sure that you are in total compliance with laws about things like rental deposits, tenant notifications, eviction action and more.

 

As you can see, property managers provide abundant services to turnkey rental property owners. This is why, at MartelTurnkey, we recommend that our investors continue to employ a property management company for turnkey rentals in Memphis and other cities, even if you opt to select a different company. This is the best way we know how to enjoy passive income from you turnkey rental property. Please contact MartelTurnkey about available rental properties today.

 

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6 Advantages of Owning a Turnkey Rental Over a Vacation Rental

A turnkey rental has a number of advantages over vacation rental properties. If you’re just getting started in real estate investing and trying to decide whether you should run an Airbnb or buy a turnkey rental, be sure to review the following advantages before you make your choice.

1. You Choose Your Residents

When you list your vacation rental on Airbnb, VRBO or another vacation rental site, you’re pretty much stuck with whatever resident you get. The guest gets to decide where they stay, not you. You have almost no control over who stays in your property. As long as they pay the money and aren’t banned for some reason, they get to use your vacation rental.

 

With a turnkey rental, you have complete control over who your tenants are. You can do background checks, establish minimum income requirements and even personally interview applicants if you want.

2. Lower Vacancy Rates

Vacation rentals have much higher vacancy rates. You might have a one or two night stay and then it sits vacant for three nights or more. Even if you enact minimum stay durations, you face vacancies in between each guest. Over time, those vacancies really add up. In a year’s time, if your vacation rental property is vacant for just two nights each week, that’s a 28% vacancy rate.

 

Turnkey rentals have some vacancy as well, but only in between leases. For the remainder of the time, you have rent money coming in on a regular basis every month. For a one-year lease, you can expect to have your turnkey rental be vacant for a month while you prepare it for the next tenant. That’s less than an 8% vacancy rate annually.

3. Lower Turnover Costs

Every time a guest vacates your vacation rental, it costs you either time or money or both. Turnover costs for vacation rentals include cleaning and sometimes repairs. The difference is that this occurs multiple times, sometimes as often as every other day. Even if you include this cost in the rate, you sacrifice price competitiveness by doing this.

 

Turnkey rentals require cleaning and maintenance, too, but usually only once a year, in between annual tenants. That’s a tiny fraction of what you have to spend for vacation rental turnover costs.

4.  Appliances and Furnishings Don’t Need to Be Maintained

When you have a vacation rental, you have to keep it furnished and with working appliances. If a guest arrives and something’s not working, you’ll get that phone call and have to take care of it immediately. That can mean running to the store at night to pick up a new microwave or toaster. It can mean sending a repairman out on a weekend to fix the broken freezer.

 

With a turnkey rental, you don’t have to supply appliances or furniture. Your tenant brings their own refrigerator so they’re responsible if something happens to it. The turnkey is unfurnished, so you don’t have to maintain sofas and coffee tables, which can get damaged from hard use.

5. More Reasonable Expectations

Vacationers expect a higher level of service and accommodation when they stay in a vacation. They’ve saved for the trip and are on a vacation that they may only get once a year. They want to be treated well. That means everything has to be as perfect as possible in the vacation rental. Anything less may get you a bad review.

 

With a turnkey rental, expectations are more reasonable. Tenants expect a clean and safe place to live, but they don’t expect the royal treatment. You don’t have to supply a welcome note or complimentary condiments and paper towels.

6. Less Competition

As an Airbnb host, you’re faced with hundreds of competitors on the same site, all vying for the same business. This forces you to lower your rates to be competitive or to offer extra amenities in order to attract guests.

 

With a turnkey rental, your competition is much more within reason. Tenants usually have certain criteria that dictate where they can live and how much they can pay in rent. As a turnkey rental owner, you may have a handful of nearby competitors, but little more than that. You also won’t be forced to lower your rental rate in order to compete.

 

Owning a turnkey rental just makes more sense for serious real estate investors than a vacation rental. There are even more advantages to owning a turnkey rental over having an Airbnb or other vacation rental property. Find out what they are here.

 

And, to see what turnkey rental properties are available in Memphis, St. Louis, Cleveland and Birmingham, please visit MartelTurnkey.com today.

 

 

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Here’s Why College Students Should Start Saving Now to Invest in Real Estate

There’s a common misconception in society that real life begins after college. This myth is an impediment to growth and an unjust narrative on what young adults are capable of accomplishing early on. There’s no better evidence of this than in the area of real estate investing. The earlier you start saving for your first real estate investment, the more you stand to gain in terms of wealth, security and passive income. Don’t let myths and outdated norms get in the way of your wealth building potential in life. Read on to learn all the compelling reasons why you should save while you’re still in college to invest in real estate as soon as possible after graduation.

 

Your Living Expenses Are Covered

 

As a college student, you’re either living at home, on campus or near campus. There are exceptions, but it’s likely that most of your living expenses are paid for. Meals come from home or a paid meal plan on campus. Utility payments may be non-existent or covered by your parents. You may even be insured on your parents’ plan. You may have no or very few bills to pay each month, which means you have more discretionary income to save for your first real estate investment.

 

Most college students move things out of their childhood bedroom very soon after graduation. After you graduate you’ll likely need to get your own place near your new job. Once you move out of the family home, the monthly bills start moving in on you. You’ll have to pay for rent, electricity, gas, internet and maybe water and trash bills; not to mention your own groceries, fuel and car insurance. It’ll be harder than ever to come up with a lump sum of money to invest in real estate after you’re saddled with all those new monthly living expenses.

 

No Student Loan Debt – Yet

 

While you’re in school the tuition bills are piling up, but you don’t have to worry about that quite yet. After you graduate, though, you’ll have to start repaying your student loan debt. Payments might start coming due immediately, or you may be able to get a six-month grace period. Either way, those monthly payments will put a large dent in whatever income you start earning from your first job after graduation. And this is on top of those monthly living expenses you now have to shell out for.

 

Fewer Family Obligations

 

As a college student, you have one person to take care of – yourself. You don’t have a spouse or children to help support or worry about. You have sole power over your decisions about what to spend your money on. There’s no better time to put away money for a future down payment on a real estate investment.

 

Shortly after graduation you may have increased family obligations. Many new graduates already have significant others in their lives. You may even already be engaged to marry or have plans to start a family very soon. The more family obligations you have, the less discretionary money you’ll have. You’ll want to set money aside so you can buy a primary residence for your new family. You’ll need money to pay hospital delivery bills, buy baby equipment and pay for pediatrician visits. That dream of investing in real estate may get pushed further and further into the distant future because you’ll have more immediate family obligations to consider.

 

More Free Time

 

Even hard-working college students have more time while in school than after they graduate. You’ll probably never have more free time than you do right now, in college. You don’t yet have career distractions, you aren’t yet being forced to put in massive hours of overtime to “prove” yourself and you don’t have a new young family placing demands on your time. Before graduation is the best time to learn about real estate investing, all the real estate investment options available, and how to earn passive income through real estate. And it’s the best time to set aside all the money you can for your real estate investment after graduation.

 

To get a Fannie Mae loan on a typical real estate investment after college, all you need is the down payment money plus one year of W-2 income, which you can acquire with your new career soon after college. You can save the down payment of about $20,000 (give or take) while in college and borrow the rest using your clean credit history as a recent grad and a new career person.

 

Don’t wait until life starts making demands on your money and time before you get started saving for your first real estate investment. College graduation isn’t some kind of “starting line” where you’re suddenly granted permission to run the race of your life. The journey toward your future financial goals can start right now, where you are at this moment. All you have to do is take the first step.

 

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Why Invest in Birmingham and St. Louis?

When you purchase a turnkey rental, you can’t do better than to invest in cities like Birmingham and St. Louis, which are both growing by leaps and bounds. When MartelTurnkey invested in properties in these two metro areas a few years ago, we knew that the areas were undervalued and worth investing in. Now, it’s evident that the light is shining on Birmingham and St. Louis. Find out what there is to love about these two southern hotspots.

 

What’s Hot in Birmingham

 

Birmingham looks to be the new hotspot for startups. Innovation Depot and Velocity Accelerator are startup incubators, offering tech support, shared space and more in a collaborative environment designed to give entrepreneurs in Birmingham the competitive edge.

 

Shipt, the grocery delivery service, soft-launched in Birmingham in 2014 with 1,000 pre-enrollments. By 2016, Shipt already operated in 27 metro areas across the country. In 2017, Target Corporation acquired Shipt for $550 million. Shipt continues to operate its headquarters in Birmingham. In July of 2018, the mayor of Birmingham met with the Alabama governor and the leaders of Shipt to announce that, rather than moving headquarters to a more established tech hub, Ship headquarters would stay in Birmingham. Not only that, but the headquarters expanded and added 881 new jobs. In appreciation, Birmingham officials extended an attractive incentive package to Shipt legacy arethat’s estimated to be worth over $16 million over the next decade.

 

Downtown Birmingham is to be the location for the new BJCC stadium. Seating 55,000 visitors, the $174 million open air stadium is projected to be completed by 2021. The UAB Blazers football team will call the new stadium home. The mayor of Birmingham and council members are planning a $300 million revitalization fund for Birmingham city neighborhoods, including renovations to the Legacy Arena.

 

What’s Hot in St. Louis

 

All signs point to St. Louis as an economic and cultural hotspot to get in on now. The downtown region is aglow with startup incubators, venture capital firms and tech startups. No less than ten St. Louis companies are on the Fortune 500 list, including Peabody Energy, Monsanto, Emerson and Graybar Electric. St. Louis is still ballooning as an economic center and the best is yet to come.

 

Construction to improve infrastructure in St. Louis is on the rise, too. The February 2019 Infrastructure Expo presented almost $1 billion in construction bid opportunities for contractors suppliers and vendors. Presentations were made by the Missouri Department of Transportation, Metropolitan Sewer District, City of St. Louis Board of Public Service, St. Louis County Department of Transportation and the Jefferson and St. Charles counties road boards.

 

It’s not too late to get on our single-family turnkey rental opportunities, but you’ll need to act fast. We have only a few left in these high-demand cities. If you’d like any information about our Birmingham or St. Louis turnkey rentals, please don’t hesitate to contact us.