Live in the Now!

Well, it’s been another hard week of conversations with our owners and potential owners.

The Christchurch market has definitely changed and it is certainly a tenants market. OWNERS- it is time to rethink

This doesn’t automatically mean that you need to lower the rent- but in many cases there is a need to be realistic and this may be the only feasible option. But here are some other questions for you to ponder…….

• Is your property up to the necessary standard?
• Is it competing with several similar properties in the local area?
• Is there a need to complete some minor decorating that has been put off over the last couple of years due to the high demand or your tenants have stayed put and there really hasn’t been an opportunity?
• Have you put off putting in new curtains or replacing the carpet because there have been plenty of potential tenants without needing to incur these costs?
• Are you showing the property off to its best advantage?
• If the sun screams in to your living areas mid-afternoon, why are you doing viewings in the morning?
• Is the property vacant and therefore a little bit chilly?- why not pop past the property a couple of hours earlier and put the heatpump on?
• Are the gardens well maintained?- it is not ok to simply say- “don’t worry- they will be done before you move in” Many tenants cannot see passed their first impression. Also you are telling them that it is ok to let them become unkempt.

So, there are a lot of non-financial factors that could help you to occupy your home HOWEVER ……..

No sentence has become more frustrating to us in current weeks than….. “but we have been getting $XXX for the last two years”….. That is fine- we accept that but we need to live in the now, landlords have benefited from the limited supply of properties that Christchurch has experienced. That was then, This is now !!! Our aim is to get a property owner the best return that they can get on their investment in the current market over a long period of time.

The way to make money from an investment property is to have it OCCUPIED. Holding out for an extra $10 or $20 a week is false economies when you then have a vacant property for weeks longer than you should have.