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You Hired a Property Manager - What's Next?

August 13, 2018 / by Brent Silberbauer

Working in the industry of property management, I get the opportunity to speak to a lot of owners. The Hignell Companies manages a wide variety of real estate, but often I find myself talking to single-family home owners who are renting out their homes for the first time. They call a little nervous, a little afraid, and have no clue what the process is to rent out their home. Here’s a little about what to expect when renting out your home for the first time. 

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Are Furnished Rental Properties a More Lucrative Strategy?

February 13, 2018 / by Brent Silberbauer

There are two types of renters in this world: those looking for fully furnished rental units, and those that are not.  The former are typically people like foreign exchange students, traveling nurses, traveling construction workers on a short term job, etc.  For these people it makes no sense for them to lug a couch, desk, table, and chairs all the way across the country, just to pack up and leave three to six months later.  The type of people looking for a fully furnished unit are probably only going to stay for a matter of months and then jump on a plane heading to their next destination.  They want to arrive with their suitcase and nothing else.  They don’t want to have to bother with putting PG&E in their name, waiting for the cable guy to show up, and they definitely don’t want to deal with unloading a moving van with a massive amount of furniture. 

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How Rental Property Managers Can Help You Plan Your Annual Budgets

January 24, 2018 / by Brent Silberbauer

“If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.”  We have all heard this catch phrase, but few of us are really taking planning seriously.  Whether it applies to our nutrition, retirement, or our investment property, planning takes time and brain power.  At our company we manage many large multifamily complexes and homeowner associations.  Around November of every year you can hear the groans from the managers as they dive into the numbers and reports to get the necessary info to put together the next year’s budgets for the properties.  Is the roof going to last another year? How much do we spend on landscaping? Can we negotiate a better rate with this vendor?  All these questions come up as I peer into the offices of the managers sharpening their pencils and getting their numbers right. 

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Property Manager Tips: Avoid Making Exceptions for Residents

January 10, 2018 / by Brent Silberbauer

the word avoid on paperNobody wants to be the mean guy. As humans, most of us have an innate desire to please people and get on people’s good side. We want to be accepted and liked by those we interact with. It’s just human nature. So, what happens when you’re a residential property manager and a prospective resident asks you to make an exception when they don’t qualify financially for your unit? What happens when your resident shares a sad story of why they are late on their rent? Do you make an exception? Should you be the proverbial “nice guy or gal?” My simple answer, for the most part is…no. Do not make exceptions. Here’s why.

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Location: The Secret to Making Your Chico Rental Property Work for You

October 18, 2017 / by Brent Silberbauer

You have probably heard that there are three rules to real estate: Location, Location, Location. The same is true with where you buy your Chico rental property real estate. When deciding how much to charge for rent or where you can buy a great rental property you need to first look at location. 

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Rental Property Management Tips: How to Nail the Turnover Process

October 13, 2017 / by Brent Silberbauer

Turning over a rental property is probably one of the trickiest parts of rental property management. You need to coordinate move-out dates, maintenance, marketing, cleaning, inspections, possibly remodeling and a whole host of other variables. No doubt this takes skill and finesse to nail down a fool proof strategy to turning over rentals. In this blog I’m going to talk to you about developing an excellent strategy that works for your Chico rental property. 

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The Real Cost of Deferred Maintenance for Chico Rental Property Owners

September 29, 2017 / by Brent Silberbauer

In the late 1980s there was an amazing TV show called MacGyver. MacGyver was a secret agent that would solve all kinds of problems using random things he had around him. He would start car engines using a bubble gum wrapper and some duct tape. It was fantastic to see his creative solutions to save the day. 

Sometimes Chico rental property owners can be a bit like MacGyver. Instead of calling a plumber to fix a leaky pipe, they will instead use some duct tape and bubble gum to save the day. The problem is that when maintenance work needs to be done, you need to do it right and do it quickly. Many properties have what we call deferred maintenance which are maintenance issues that are left undone

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5 Tips to Evaluate a Fair Price for Multifamily Rental Property Units

September 13, 2017 / by Brent Silberbauer

In my small town of Chico, as well as all over California, the rental property market has been on fire.  Currently we have never seen such high rents with such low vacancies. As a matter of fact, I’d be willing to say in our 60-year history, it’s never been quite as good as it is now. Rents are up and vacancies are very low. At the moment, the vacancy rate over our 1,500 local units sits at .56%, and this is after we raised all our rents and built 56 brand new apartments. Pretty amazing!

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A Quick Action Plan for a Successful Lease Up of Your Rental Property

September 06, 2017 / by Brent Silberbauer

Most readers of our blog are holding anywhere from one to 20 rental units. However, there’s a growing movement of apartment developers who are building brand new luxury apartments with well over 20 units. For those of you out there who are planning on building brand new apartments there will come a time when you will need to lease them up. If you self-manage your properties, you should know there’s an art and science to doing a lease up well.

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The Key to Filling Your Chico Rental Property is Selling the Benefits

August 16, 2017 / by Brent Silberbauer

If you’re just popping into this blog you may have noticed that this is a series of blogs about how to sell your rental units to prospective residents. If you missed the first two, you can check them out by clicking below:

The #1 Question to Ask Yourself to Fill Your Chico Rental Property

Tips to Understand Your Customer and Fill Your Chico Rental Property 

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