Renters choose not to renew a lease for your single-family homes or multi-family rental property for a variety of reasons, and one of the biggest is poor maintenance services. Whether a property owner chooses poor-quality DIY repairs or is too slow to respond to maintenance issues, renters in the San Antonio area won’t stick around for a property that isn’t well-maintained!
- Investors in San Antonio and surrounding areas must prioritize property maintenance to build better relationships with residents and generate more income.
- Staying on top of routine maintenance and responding quickly when residents report a problem is also one of the most critical aspects of protecting your assets and your income.
The first step in being proactive about maintenance is planning your budget. Do you have cash set aside for repairs and seasonal maintenance for your homes for rent? If not, follow these tips from the experts in San Antonio property management!
Don’t Wait for Things to Break
Saving money is an essential part of improving your profits from rent collection—but holding off on repairs or routine maintenance is not the right way to cut your rental property expenses. In many cases, you’ll spend more money when something breaks and becomes an expensive repair rather than maintaining your property properly!
- You might think you’re saving money for a couple of years or improving cash flow if you don’t spend money on seasonal HVAC system maintenance.
- However, when the unit stops working when it should last several more years, you’ll deal with an expensive system replacement that you could have avoided.
- Routine maintenance can often prolong the life of many aspects of a rental property, including the HVAC system.
- Keep a schedule of routine inspections and preventative maintenance. Budget for these smaller repairs and upgrades throughout the year to avoid significant and expensive repairs later!
Saving a Penny Now Isn’t Always Worth It Later
Cheaper isn’t often better when it comes to the care of your rental properties. We don’t mean you need to overspend for vendor repair services. However, picking the cheapest option to save a few dollars now can turn into a more expensive repair or replacement later; we just know this from our years of experience.
With cheap repair services, you often get what you pay for. If your renter reports a plumbing issue, the cheapest plumber might provide a low-cost, ‘bandaid’ solution—but you could get another call from your renter right away when the same problem happens again.
Quality vendors and repairs help San Antonio property investors:
- Save money on repairs done the first time correctly
- Build better relationships with residents who don’t want to deal with the same problem more than once
- Protect your investments by providing better services to boost your long-term return on investment.
Vetting a network of excellent contractors also helps investors save money on repairs over time. You protect your properties and your residents when you only choose from trustworthy contractors to do work in and around the property.
Set Money Aside for Emergencies
Even with an excellent schedule of routine maintenance, things break unexpectedly. As an expert San Antonio property management company, we know your maintenance budget must include cash reserves to cover the cost of emergency repairs for your properties. Without planning for unexpected maintenance issues, you can quickly lose money on a property.
How Much?
Each property is unique—and there’s not a ‘one-size-fits-all’ budget amount that investors should set aside for maintenance emergencies. However, you can still plan your budget with a formula.
- Depending on the age of your property and the associated expenses for the property, setting aside 1% of the property’s value is an excellent place to start when considering potential emergency maintenance expenses.
- An additional option is to reserve $1 annually for every square foot of your property. If your property has 2000 square feet, then that’s $2,000 each year set aside just for maintenance.
If that seems like a lot of money to keep in your back pocket—or you have a new investment property without much cash flow—start lower and increase it as you generate more income from the property. Having ‘some’ money set aside for emergencies is better than none at all!
A Property Manager Is the Best Maintenance Plan
Many investors underestimate the amount of money it takes to keep a property well-maintained while also preparing for those expensive emergency repairs. With the help of expert San Antonio property management services, you don’t have to worry about planning a maintenance budget or coordinating vendors to do the work.
Hiring a property manager boosts your maintenance services and helps you retain residents! Experts have the necessary insight for:
- Managing your monthly cash flow from rentals
- Budgeting routine and emergency maintenance expenses
- Vetting vendors to provide the best service at the best prices—safely
- Scheduling preventative maintenance and coordinating vendors in an emergency.
Property investors benefit from a property manager’s approved network of maintenance providers. You’ll stretch your maintenance budget with the advantages of better pricing and quality repairs!
Budget Expertly San Antonio Property Management!
Budgeting for maintenance expenses can be overwhelming—but it’s a critical task to help you find success as a San Antonio property investor! Let the professionals in San Antonio property management help you create and maintain your property maintenance budget—and watch your bottom line and resident retention improve!
San Antonio Property Management helps investors with maintenance budgets as part of our property management services. When we help you establish a budget, we also make sure you’re in the loop on maintenance expenses when they happen. Ready to get started? Contact us!
If you are interested in having your property managed by Real Property Management Campanas, have more questions, or just want to speak to one of our team members, then contact us online or call us directly at (210) 314-1039 today!