In the United States, approximately 10.6 million people earn income from more than 17 million rental properties.
While renting out an investment property is a great way to earn extra income, owning property comes with a lot of responsibility. As a landlord, you also have to handle rent collection. Unfortunately, some renters are constantly late with their rent. Thankfully, there's a solution to this problem.
Keep reading if your renters need to be more timely with their rent payments. Here are our five best tips for streamlining rent collection.
1. Send Reminders
One easy way to help tenants pay their rent on time is to send reminders. Life gets busy, and sometimes people forget things. We never know what is going on in someone else's life, so sending a gentle reminder may help those who need it.
As a real estate owner, there are several ways you can send these reminders. You can send them via email, use a tenant portal, or hire a property manager to handle the reminders for you.
2. Use a Tenant Portal
As mentioned above, another way to streamline the rent collection process is to sign up for a tenant portal. The tenant portal allows you to communicate openly and directly with your tenants.
This tenant portal contains and organizes essential information about each tenant renting your property. The portal will manage payments, communication preferences, financial balances, and more. Your tenant will be able to log in and pay rent conveniently online.
3. Apply Fines
One of the more unpleasant ways to get your rent collection process streamlined is to implement fines for late rent payments. You must stipulate this late fee in your rental property lease agreement and any other details you need your tenant to understand.
Check your state laws because some states have regulations regarding how much you can charge in late penalties.
4. Offer Multiple Payment Methods
If your renters are paying rent late, one possible reason is that the available payment method isn't convenient. If your tenants have to go out of their way to make a rent payment, there is a high chance they'll delay it until they no longer can.
If you offer several ways for the tenant to pay, they'll choose the most convenient and should start paying monthly rent on time.
5. Hire a Property Manager
Our last rent collection tip is to hire a property manager to handle everything for you. Most property managers will manage lease renewals, tenant screening, rent collection, and property maintenance. This way, you won't have to send reminders or handle rent collection.
Make Rent Collection a Breeze
Investing in property rentals is a great way to earn extra money. If your tenants are late with their rent payments, follow the rent collection tips in this blog and start seeing results. Offering alternate payment methods, enforcing late fees, using a tenant portal, and hiring a property manager can help your renters pay on time.
If you need help collecting your rent on time, get in touch with us so we can assist. We have experts in San Diego waiting to help you.
