Posts by madwire

Real estate is unlike other investment strategies like bonds or stocks. Congress has laws in place to reward investors who invest in real estate. Why? Well this country needs housing and government isn’t into housing (for the most part), so they encourage anyone who wants to provide housing by offering tax incentives. Additionally, real estate…

To be straight up, there is good and evil in this world. God and Satan or any other label you ascribe to. As such, we are experiencing different methods of which these evil acts are carried out. Whether there is an increase in the number of attacks or not, that’s a topic that requires more…

Let’s face it, people usually do not enter a legally binding lease with the intention of breaking it. Sometimes life deals us challenges that conflicts with our current lease. Whether its job related, family or health issues. There is a plethora of situations that can arise that will have you asking the question, ‘How can…

In order to fill your vacancies, you first need to know what renters want. That list can vary widely based on the type of rental property you have. Renters moving into an apartment will have different ‘wants’ then those moving into a single-family home. Longer Term Renters For those who are longer term renters, they…

Financial reports are a critical element for property managers and property owners. Without these reports, how do you know the financial health of your portfolio or a single property? Decisions are often made based on your current financial status. General Accounting Most general accounting applications are not designed for managing real estate properties. I’ve been…

Open houses are a great way to generate interest as well as some urgency when it comes to renting your properties. They have been used by real estate agents for decades because they work, sort of. They say between 4-10% of sales contracts are a result of open houses. However, for rental properties, there are…

You know the saying, a picture is worth a 1000 words. There is no denying the fact that great looking photos will help your marketing efforts. Renters are more inclined to choose a property that has a lot of photos with high quality. What most renters do, is shop for rental properties and then imagine…

I am a longtime user of QuickBooks. I’ve used it for all my companies since 1998. This BLOG highlights the PropertyZar accounting software as it pertains to property management. QuickBooks – A Good Role Model As we designed PropertyZar’s accounting, we wanted to make it as easy as QuickBooks. But we wanted to include all the accounting…

Hedge Your Real Estate Investments Real estate has been experiencing some phenomenal returns over the past several years. Even the stock market has been a long running bull market. Several factors play into this. Low interest rates as well as low inventory have benefited the real estate market. Anyone who has studied markets understand that is it certainly…

Raising rents is a question we see a lot. Should you or shouldn’t you. For those landlord’s or property managers that do raise rents, 2-4% seem to be the typical range. Good Tenants If you have good tenants who take care of your property, pay on time and all-around good tenants, raising their rent may…