Why did we buy this property?

This was our second investment property, purchased four months after our first deal, and located in the same neighborhood. We were fortunate that the first deal did very well relative to our expectations, and since we had saved some money we decided to buy a second property. The main difference relative to our first deal is that this town home has three bedrooms instead of two. The purchase price was $8k higher, but the rental income was higher, hence the metrics look better. Unfortunately with this property we had many issues the first two years, having to almost evict a tenant and fix multiple appliances. Every landlord has a property that causes more issues than all the others combined, for us this is the one.     

Lessons learned

• Develop a strong tenant screening process, and always follow it. After our first tenant vacated the property, we started looking for a new tenant. Since we didn’t want to have the property vacant we decided to quickly rent it without following the recommended screening processes. A few months later the tenant was not able to pay the rent in time and we decided to serve an eviction notice according to the lease agreement. One day later we received a call from the tenant’s lawyer and it became a very stressful process. Luckily, we were able to settle amicably, but it’s not an experience anyone wants to go through.
• Fix issues immediately. One of our tenants had an issue with the washer and dryer. It took us a few days to schedule a visit by the technician. The technician “fixed” the appliances, but they broke again a few weeks later. Needless to say, it made the tenant very unhappy. Long story short, we ended up replacing the appliances and spending much more money than if we had done it at the beginning. Remember, a happy tenant equals a happy landlord. Now we schedule and/or fix issues within 24 hours of the notice.