Choosing A Property Manager

We break down what a good property manager really saves you, from rent rises and lease accuracy to insurance-ready inspections and fewer vacancies. We also share a practical proactive maintenance approach that protects your property, your tenants, and your time. 

• the hidden costs of weak systems and rushed routine inspections 
• why landlords should actually read inspection reports 
• how inspection software and agency structure change service quality 
• the unseen workload: neighbour complaints, conflict, legislation, email overload 
• “closing the loop” to stop open-ended situations dragging on 
• why calling beats long email chains, then confirming in writing 
• better interview questions than fees and portfolio size 
• red flags: slow marketing, slow replies, no holiday cover, sloppy email etiquette 
• proactive maintenance examples: gutter cleaning, aircon servicing, reticulation checks, hot water age tracking 

If anyone ever has any questions that they do want us to discuss or topics, feel free to message us through.

Transcript

Welcome And Why We Exist

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to The Informed Investor. It is a podcast that we started last year and we got the involvement of a lot of property managers around Australia, which we will probably continue to do, but we also just wanted to use it as a platform to showcase some behind the scenes discussions that investors might find interesting. So joining me, I have Marissa, who's going to be hosting quite a lot of these conversations in the future. So welcome Marissa.

unknown 0:32

Thanks for having me out.

The Real Cost Of A Bad PM

SPEAKER_00 0:34

So, well, I'm not really having you, like it's a bit of that's right. It's a bit of a lot of things behind the scenes that happen in real estate agencies and property management departments. And it's just really good to sort of share those conversations and the behind the scenes as well of uh of what happens in our world, and hopefully it just prompts some uh new ideas and thoughts and questions for investors to ask their property managers wherever they are based. So today's topic is how to pick a good property manager and why proactive maintenance matters. Um I'm going to start off with asking you, Marissa, how much does the wrong property manager actually cost you and what does that look like in real life?

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Great question. There's quite a few different ways that you can look at this. So maintenance we'll kind of come to in a second, but the wrong property manager, if you're going with someone that doesn't have the right systems behind them, they're not supported in their company, that's when little things get missed, and those 100% add up over time. So that can look like missed rent increases, it can look like incorrect leases. You know, I've had I've seen people in the past sign lease agreements for the wrong term, and then the tenants have been signed on to an agreement when the owner needed to come in. So there's a few different ways that it can come through in terms of the lease agreements, but then when you look at the maintenance side of things, if you've got a property manager and they're going through their routine inspections in a rush, they're not picking up on things like overflowing gutters or cracks that have appeared, things like that can really build and add up to bigger maintenance problems. So if we're not checking those gutters at those routine inspections, and then we have heavy rainfall without getting the gutters cleaned, that's when it can turn into a roof leak. And quite often when we are lodging insurance claims for owners, they'll actually ask for our routine inspection reports and have had it in the past where there's been things that weren't picked up on in a routine, but you can see it in the photos, and that can actually affect the owners' insurance claims.

SPEAKER_00 2:36

Yeah, and if we can touch on the routine inspections a bit more because this morning there was a post on TikTok and it was an angry landlord uh based over in Victoria, and his property manager had done a routine inspection last year, and no one noticed that there was a carport that was missing. The carport had just been removed by the tenant. And it was really interesting because if you are a if you have a uh department where someone else does all the routine inspections, they're going to pick up if things are damaged. They're going to pick up, you know, maintenance items and all of that. But imagine you've got a property with a clean cut carport removed, you wouldn't actually know any better because I don't think landlords actually realize that when you do a routine inspection, you're not comparing a property condition report or that ingoing report at the routine inspection, you're going there to look at different things. Um, and I just think it's a really interesting point. And probably a little bit of responsibility, dare I say, needs to go back to the landlord as well to read those routine inspections and to potentially pick up on something like that because I can actually see how that could have happened.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

Yeah, absolutely. I agree with you, but it does also come back to the property manager as well. Uh, I know it's not realistic to expect that every routine inspection is going to be compared to the previous one. Let's be real, no property manager actually has time to do that for every single report. But when I was a property manager, I would include like I had the option on the app that I was using to include the previous inspection photos just to refer to on the app while I was at the property. So I could go through and kind of click through the photos, see what it looked like previously. First of all, it made my job a lot easier because it meant that I wasn't having to document things that had already been like fixed or addressed, and then I could check that things that were previously noticed had been fixed up between the last report and now. But if you're a property manager and you're going through a property for the first time, you aren't going to know what the condition was to start with. So it kind of does fall back to the PM to make sure that when you're in a new portfolio or you're going out to a new property, to be honest, even if you're helping out someone in your office, you really should be checking through the last report just to make sure there's anything that you need to keep an eye on. And maybe that property manager would have noticed that the entire PowerPoint was missing.

SPEAKER_00 5:06

Yeah. There's just so many. I'm trying not to go down a rabbit hole because there are so many discussions to have, which we will have in future episodes. But you know, it comes down to the, like you said, the inspection software that you use in terms of does it have the ability to look at previous photos? It comes down to how the office is set up. Do they have an independent person that does inspections? Do they outsource? Does a property manager do them? Like so many factors and all of these factors, new business, uh new landlords don't ask that when they're appointing a property manager.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

Because they don't know.

SPEAKER_00 5:45

Because they don't know. So I'm really, really looking forward to sort of, you know, the future episodes where we're going to actually talk about those things so that investors can have better questions to ask new property managers when they're looking at and shopping around for a property manager, know those better questions. What inspection program do they use? Who does the routines? I can't tell you the last new landlord who asked me those questions. Never. Yeah, neither. But again, they just don't know what they don't know. So that's yeah, that's really exciting to discuss. Absolutely, absolutely. We're going to be talking about um even like the software. Um, Marissa's a great expert when it comes to software and options for landlords to understand and know of. Actually, there was one the other day that um it we don't have the client yet, but she emailed me and she had um asked about some maintenance. She's had a really bad tenant since November, has no money coming through. The her current property manager is trying to release the property, but there's lots of expenses that need to be spent, the aircon and all of that. She's got no money to do it. And I emailed her back because she's like, what do I do? So I emailed her back and said, maybe ask if the property manager has TAPI, which is a maintenance program, because then you might have some financial access to borrow funds while the property's vacant. And she was like, Oh, amazing, I'll go back and ask them. And I just explained to her how to ask how to ask whether they've got the program or not. And um she was doing that. So that type of thing is really helpful for landlords to know. So when we say how to pick a good property manager, it's not just about the property manager, it's about the stuff behind the things. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 7:23

The systems, the support in the agency, even things like the culture can make a big impact on the service that you actually get from your PM. So it all ties in.

What Property Managers Actually Handle

SPEAKER_00 7:32

Yeah, absolutely. Next question, Jimmy.

SPEAKER_01 7:37

So beyond collecting rent, what does a property manager actually do day to day? And why do so many investors not realize the full scope of the role until something goes wrong?

SPEAKER_00 7:47

Yeah. Very timely, isn't it, that question? Because what does what does a property manager actually even do? Um at the moment, they're dealing with behavioral issues.

SPEAKER_01 7:59

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 8:00

I would say that's like the biggest problem. And that is unseen. Like, I don't think like property uh sorry, landlords, they see that the rent's paid, maintenance reported, inspections done, like tick, tick, tick. But the stuff in between, they don't see. So um just trying to think of like some good examples where um, well, at the moment we've got one, um, which was the house where the naughty tenant had the police over. And the the neighbors, I think, pretty much were on the phone all day to the property manager and complaining. And then I started getting the overflow because they weren't happy with you know wanting to put a complaint in, and they were acting like I was the one that did the criminal activity, like the way that they were carrying on.

SPEAKER_01 8:52

Or that you had the ability to just go and kick them out then and there. That's right. People don't understand that there's processes, there's legislation that we have to follow. Yeah. But people's expectations in the last few years have just become astronomical and they expect outcomes immediately.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

No one has the patience anymore, and they don't understand the processes and the things that we are bound by on our end.

SPEAKER_00 9:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:14

So I I definitely felt for the property manager with that one.

SPEAKER_00 9:17

Yeah. And and it's a lot of like I find it's a lot of neighbour issues. Actually, it's probably a really big neighbor issues. I want to, yeah, I'm gonna say neighbour issues taking up a lot of time that's unaccounted for and we don't get paid for, and um break leases and tenants personal, you know, I'm separating, I'm leaving the house, fights between husband, wife's, fights between co-tenants, yes, their house. Yes. We got a bad review once, didn't we? Because we had said to the tenant, you've got to work it out, it's your housemate, nothing to do with the lease. And we got a bad review because we weren't helping. It's like that's not our business to help you.

SPEAKER_01 9:53

As though we were meant to intervene and and manage the conflict between them. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

Correct. Um, and I know that yeah, I remember I had to mediate between a husband and wife with the bond and trying to say, Listen, I've been there before, just hand it over. It's really not worth it. It's two weeks' rent, give your half bond back, just close it, move on. And it's like those things that they're not seeing because you don't call up the investor and say, I've just had to deal with your relationship issues in your in your house. We don't tell you about that because we just have to deal with it. So I feel like at the moment that's taking up a lot of time, which is unaccountable for. Um, and uh it it begs the question: are we managing tenancies or are we managing properties?

SPEAKER_01 10:41

Because we're managing relationships.

SPEAKER_00 10:44

Yeah. Which is pretty shitty at the moment.

SPEAKER_01 10:48

Very time consuming.

SPEAKER_00 10:49

I'm pretty sure that in the past, where it's just like two emails, now it is about four or five emails going back and forth to try and close off things.

SPEAKER_01 10:59

We um all written by Chat GPT. Oh, yes. Every single one of them.

Close The Loop And Call People

SPEAKER_00 11:04

Yeah. So I I try to educate the team that the longer the email that you get sent, the shorter you respond. Don't go, it's too many words otherwise. And we go into a big tit for tat, really. So I um that's how I try to deal with that. But we shared in our um, we've got an office uh private sort of staff group, a team uh messenger group, and we had in there the other day I shared a video by one of the trainers, a real estate trainer over East, Julie, and she did a really good video on closing the loop. And I think that was that's something that really resonated with me. And this is something that can help landlords as well as property managers and maybe help landlords understand what the property manager is trying to do, and that's closing the loop. So what we find is that we've got lots of open-ended situations that are all up in the air because we're waiting on a response from you as the landlord or the tenant, and so closing the loop is referring to the fact that if you haven't got back to me in a certain time frame, I'm gonna respond with a really good email to say, as I haven't heard from you, your tenant will roll over on a periodic tenancy, for example, and closing it in a way so that I'm not leaving open-ended. That was something I just really liked that video that she did.

SPEAKER_01 12:17

Yeah, same. And I think it really resonated with the team as well. So much of this job is back and forth. Um, coming back to the email trains, my biggest thing is pick up the phone. Yeah. Like I understand needing to have things in writing, especially in this day and age, but if I'm helping a property manager when like going through conflict resolution, they've got these back and forth emails to just pick up the phone. When you can actually hear people's tone in their voice as well, it makes a big difference and also stops them from all of those AI-generated emails. Like it's it's giving you that chance to first of all work on the connection between them and come to a quicker resolution. And then once you've finished up, it's easy to quick quickly send through confirmation email as per our phone call, but it just saves so much time and so much back and forth as well. So I find that that's I do have to kind of remind people of that and how much it does make a big difference. Yeah. And to be honest, I've had owners in the past when I've been helping step in for conflict that have said to me, Oh, I actually really appreciate that you just took the time and called me straight away.

SPEAKER_00 13:16

Yeah, totally. That that's one of the biggest issues with um, you know, people that are frustrated with their property managers, it's just because they can't get hold of them. That's really all it is. Um the so I've been covering a portfolio, just a small one, while um we're in between property managers, and I am very time poor with it, and I have had to pick up the phone. So yesterday, I needed to close those loops quickly because I I don't have time to keep open loops like with this portfolio. So I would yeah, been calling the owners, getting the answer, and dealing with it straight away. And I have found that incredibly helpful. And what um what I find, and speaking to the rest of the team, is that regardless if you've got 50 properties or 300 properties under management, you will absorb the time that you have your full-time work week in whatever you've got. Like if you've got 50 properties, you'll still take 40 hours a week to manage it. If you've got 300 properties, you'll still take 40 hours. And the difference is like those closing the loops, picking up the phone, and this is why I said to Chelsea yesterday, Chelsea's like, I don't have time to go back and forth. She's on the phone, make a decision now so I can move on with it. Where someone who has lots of time can just send the email, let me know tomorrow. And so this is why I get really frustrated at that question that owners ask when they come up, um, how many properties does your property manager manage? And I say, you don't even know what the right answer is. Like you're asking me, but you don't know what the right answer is. Because I would I would say that the person with a larger portfolio is probably better with their time than the person with 50.

SPEAKER_01 14:55

Yeah, absolutely.

Smart Questions To Ask Before Signing

SPEAKER_00 14:56

Because they've got no choice but to be good with their time. It's like um, you know, we we say, you know, give give a busy person something to do and she'll get it done. It's a classic example. So 100%. So maybe when you ask uh that question, uh put some value on a high portfolio because that would tell me they're pretty productive. But you've got a little tip for everyone. Okay, when an investor is interviewing a property manager, oh here we go, we'll go into this now. When an investor is interviewing a property manager, what are the non-negotiable questions they should be asking before they hand over their asset? Let's actually, let's I'm gonna first of all say what they're asking me at the moment, and then you can answer what they should be asking. Yeah. Because at the moment, they're asking how many properties a property manager manages. Then you get a little business lesson from me when you ask that question. Um, then they're asking your fees. Um and to be honest, I I want to say that they're the two main questions that are asked. Um, they might ask who manages a property, but very rarely, they don't want to really know the history of that person, experience that person, know nothing. So they're the two things that people are asking. What do you think they should be asking?

SPEAKER_01 16:14

So instead of just asking how many property managers have you got on the team, or you know, how many properties is each property manager managing, ask about the actual structure before you ask about the numbers. Because sure you could have someone that's on 200 properties, and to them that might sound possibly alarming. But if you find out the actual structure in the business, they likely have admin support, they might have inspection or leasing support. You know, it's typical that they'll actually have a full-time BDM in the office. So while 200 properties might sound like a lot, if they have the right structure and support set up in that office, like you said, they're probably giving you better service than the property manager that's only on 50 to 70. So I think that's really important to find out the sort of structure because that can also then affect you know moving forward. If you start getting calls from someone else in the leasing department and you had no idea that that was the structure from the start, that's something you might want to know. You might be the sort of owner that only wants to deal with your property manager throughout the leasing process. And if you don't ask those questions at the start, it can kind of take you by surprise. So having those expectations going into it makes a big difference. It's really important to ask what software they're using. So this is a big one. I love software, I love tech, I love talking about all of this. And there's so many options out there, but it can really make a big difference as to the service that you receive. So if you sign up with an agency that is maybe a trustless platform, to some investors that's a bonus, that's actually what they're after. They want those instant payments, but to others, that might not work for their financial goals. So it's really important to find out what system are they using. You know, are they doing instant payments? Is it mid-month and end month? Are you only going to get the payments at the end of the month? All of these things do make a big difference into their cash flow for the property. So I'd say that that's my other biggest question to focus on. Um and then also, this is a I guess a slightly different one, but does the agency support personal development with those property managers? This has been a hot topic that we've all been talking about lately. Um and you want to know that your property manager is actually committed to continually providing you a good service. And if they're in an agency where they get their mandatory CPD points and nothing else, how do you know that that property manager is doing everything that they can to learn about the changes in legislation more than what's just required of actually really understanding it? You know, are they learning different ways that they can add value to your service? Are they really understanding the tenancy and and how to manage conflict with those tenancies? If they just clock in, and this could not be the property manager's fault, this could be that they're in an agency that doesn't support them. But if they're just in a nine-to-five job with no external support, no networking or community involvement, that's not really a property manager that you can see having long-term because they're very quickly going to end up hitting the point of burnout, and that's when you start to get agencies that are just churning and burning those property managers.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

So what you're saying is they should really ask if they are PM collective members. Oh, shameless plug. Well, then they know that they're, you know, educated in that. Um, I think that's a really good point, actually, because not the PM collective.

unknown 19:26

What you're saying.

SPEAKER_00 19:27

Um, because the if you think about it, the people that don't get the opportunity to network in their industry, love their career, love where they're working, and don't get that opportunity, they are going to be driven by money and they're also going to move when the next best thing's offered to them. So the longevity of that team is probably not going to be as strong as an agency that has that good culture and that good support for the industry. So that could be like a yeah, a really good question to ask and to suggest that, yeah, you've got people that love what they do. They're less likely to get burnt out, they're less likely to have sick days every second day. Like, so that would be a really good factor. I I've only ever once in my whole career ever been asked this question, and it was, I was, I loved it so much when someone asked me, it was probably about 15 years ago, and someone said to me, What are you doing to look after your team's mental health? Oh, I love that. I was like, what a great question. He threw me because I was like, whoa, like I didn't know how to answer, even though I was doing good stuff, but I didn't know how to answer that. Um, and yeah, it was just a really good discussion point. Um, and what a great question to ask.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

What a great owner.

SPEAKER_00 20:42

Yeah, yeah, can't remember who the owner was, but it was yeah, really awesome. Um, we are going to do more sessions on software because I I guess the other thing I would say is that investors can ask what software's going to be used, and there's going to be benefits for it all. But if they don't know what having that software means, then they're not going to know how it's actually going to affect them as well. So we will do more episodes in regards to the nitty-gritty of software and what the benefits are of each, yeah, and the sell what the property manager will sell you as a feature, um, so that you know as well. Because I think that'll be a pretty interesting uh conversation to have.

Red Flags That Signal Trouble

SPEAKER_01 21:24

I'm excited to have it. I know, I'm sure you are. All right, I am gonna ask you now, what are the red flags that tell you immediately this is not the right property manager, even if they say all the right things on the surface?

SPEAKER_00 21:38

So, from an investor's point of view, um, the red flags, probably in the very, very early days, a red flag to me would be if you are going through, you've said yes to a property manager and the marketing starts and they say to you, um, we can't get the property online straight away because our photographer can't. Can't do photos till next week. And that's actually a true story that came up. And I was like, what do you mean? Like, just get another photographer. And this property manager only used this one photographer, and this poor owner had the property vacant for a week, waiting for that photographer. And it was like, where was the sense of urgency? And like that owner's losing$600 a week, say, because you want to use your own photographer. Like, look outside the square. So for me, that would be a real big red flag. If someone said that to me, that's a big worry. That's a big worry. And again, there's the questions that people don't ask when they start, like, how quickly can my property be online? What's the what's the yeah, the the time between me signing in the property listed and going live? Like those types of questions never get asked. So that would be probably a real red flag. Another red flag would be to be honest, I feel like your gut is a real, is a real big one. Property managers use their gut when they have application processing. And I think that yeah, your gut's going to tell you if something's not right. I would say probably as things go on in terms of the longer you have the property being managed, red flags that you can start seeing is probably property managers, yeah, not just starting to get a little bit tardy with their communication, um, taking more than two days to get back to you is probably where I'd be like, well, that's pushing it a bit two or three days. Um if you find that they go on holiday and they don't get any support, um, is probably a bit of a red flag because that's going to then cause a build-up of work and everything just starts spiraling. Um they're probably the main red flags. I guess it's just the community, yeah, the communication is the first thing to fail. There's lots of little things that property managers do that I don't love that you might see pop up. And that would be something as simple as you have some maintenance come through from a tenant and the property manager just forwards you the whole email and you've got all the tenants' details. And I know you can get it from the lease agreement, but still it's a bit bit lazy just to forward on an email from a tenant to an owner to say, see email below, what would you like me to do? I hate that. Um, I think that that would probably be uh the reason why that's a bit of a red flag is because I feel like that's a little bit of an overshare. So if they're doing it to you, are they doing that back to the tenant? Are they forwarding your email onto the tenant?

unknown 24:37

Most likely.

SPEAKER_00 24:37

Most likely, that's right. So I think that that would that would worry me a little bit. Um, I think sometimes property managers, and it can be an age thing, just the the etiquette of emails and what someone sees as normal and not normal is is don't assume that they um they know what the etiquette is. Because when when that actually was a true case study that came up on one of the Facebook groups recently, like what was actually might have been even at the one of the investor groups, and it was talking about how um an email was forwarded on from a tenant to an owner. And it was very mixed from the responses because people were like, well, the tenant details are in the lease agreement, so are they really violating anyone's privacy because the owners have got access to that? So technically, depending state dependent actually, but yeah, but the um this one was um was uh yeah, like that that's true, but that's not the part that I'm concerned about. The part that I'm concerned about is the laziness of it.

SPEAKER_01 25:43

Yeah, I have another red flag to add. Yeah. And mine is if there's no staff profiles on the website.

SPEAKER_00 25:49

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 25:50

I find if I am looking at another agency, if I can't find anything on their website, meet the team about us, anything like that, to me that immediately indicates that they've got a really high staff turnover to the point that they just don't bother updating their website anymore.

SPEAKER_00 26:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:06

I think so much of this job is relationship management, and it's kind of nice to have a look and see who you are going to be speaking to moving forward and read a little bit about them. So if you go on someone's website and there's no mention about their staff, that's a pretty good big indicator that it's a high turnover in that agency.

Proactive Maintenance That Saves Money

SPEAKER_00 26:23

Yeah, yeah, very good one. Proactive versus reactive maintenance. Uh, what is the real cost difference and why do many landlords still operate in a reactive mode? I'm going to reframe that a little bit, um, maybe to why property managers still operate in a reactive mode. Um, do you want to talk about the proactive maintenance that we plan for our clients each year? What that looks like.

SPEAKER_01 26:48

Yeah, absolutely. So the first one, because it's top of mind, we've just recently done this, is annual gutter cleaning. Yeah. So every year, typically about March, we send out an email to all of our owners. We typically try to find one contractor that can service the whole portfolio across Perth and we'll get that fixed price for them. Send out the bulk communications and just say if you'd like this done, let us know. But give them the reasons why. So preventing any sort of build-up that can then cause roof leaks later. And then also the fact that we're sending this out to them now to get ahead of not only the rain, but even just the business period. So for garter cleaning contractors, the second the rain does start, they get booked out for all of all of the winter. So by starting this process earlier, make sure that we can actually be proactive and get ahead of that, get everything done, and then once the rains do start, we know that we're safe.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

They can prevent the um leaking into the face of the Eves as well.

SPEAKER_01 27:40

Yeah, exactly. So it's making the property manager's life easier because they're not having to deal with a roof leak, deal with an insurance claim. It's making the tenants' life easier because they're not inconvenienced by having a roof leak, and it also makes the owner's life easier because taking that proactive approach obviously is going to save them a lot of money in the long run in terms of not causing any damage to the property. So that's our first one that's top of mind. Um in winter we send out summer aircon servicing emails. So again, making sure that we're doing this before the warmer months, we get a fixed price sent out to all of our owners, and we recommend that that's done on an annual basis. But the point of that is to make sure that we know that the system is running properly. It's getting those cleans that it needs, it's getting that annual service to make sure everything's actually working. And then when the warmer months do start, we're kind of we're identifying any issues before it gets to that point. So again, for the tenants, you know, unfortunately in WA, Aircon isn't a requirement and it's not considered urgent maintenance. And if you have an aircon that breaks pretty much from September onwards, you're looking at a minimum four-week wait time to get it fixed, and that's not including if there needs to be any special parts ordered in. So there's a lot that kind of happens behind the scenes. So when we take that proactive approach of sending out the annual servicing in the winter months, first of all, we normally get a better price because obviously the aircom contractors if they're quieter periods to offer a better price. But yeah, we're we're identifying any issues earlier and we're just making sure that we're staying ahead of it. So that definitely helps strengthen the relationship with the tenants as well. Not just for the PM, but for the owner. The feedback we get from those tenants is oh wow, we really appreciate this. And it gives them that sense of security that first of all, the owner does care and prioritizes actually maintaining the property, but it means that they don't have to worry coming into summer that they're gonna get a surprise issue or yeah, have to deal with any sort of broken aircons on our lovely 40-degree days that we have here.

SPEAKER_00 29:41

Yeah, and then wanting it fixed the next day. Because the thing, uh my understanding with aircon is that the evaporative systems generally the aircon person will have parts mostly, but any other system that it's not possible for an aircon contractor to store parts because there's hundreds and different types of parts for every type of unit, so therefore, um you have to wait parts, and that's a yeah, six to eight week wait sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 30:07

So yeah, exactly. A few other things that we kind of work on, it's not so much maintenance, but we do send out those reminders to tenants for reticulation to making sure they're turning it off before oh yeah, before the sprinkler band that we have, and then turning it on again when the sprinkler band's lifted. Um and at that point we ask them to check that the system is working to make sure that there's no issues. If there is, it just means that we can get those things addressed before the the weather gets too hot and all the lawns die off. Yeah. Um and then something else that we've been trying to work in recently is documenting the age of the hot water systems. Yeah. So making sure that those are being checked at the routine inspections that can pretty easily identify for hot water systems, you know, on its way out that you can tell they they don't look too great after once they've hit their limit. So if we identify that at the routine inspection and just flag it with the owner, hey, I checked the hot water system, it looks like it's about 10 years old. We've seen some that are closer to 20, and it's shocking that they're still going. Um, it just means that we're keeping an eye on it and we can tell the owner, hey, I'd probably expect in the next year or so that we'll need to have this replaced. So maybe just start planning for that financially.

Final Takeaways And Message Us Topics

SPEAKER_00 31:13

Yeah. And and I guess to finish off, is if you are an investor and your property manager doesn't do proactive maintenance, there is nothing stopping you being a proactive landlord and emailing your property manager to say, Hey, can you arrange my gutter cleaning? Hey, can you arrange my aircon servicing? So don't necessarily put blame on a property manager, a good property manager will do it, but do take responsibility as an investor if they're not, because at the end of the day, it's your property and you want to make sure that it's as stress-free as possible for you as well. So um, excellent discussion. So um I hope everyone got something out of that, and um, we look forward to delivering more episodes. And if anyone ever has any questions that they do want us to discuss or topics, feel free to message us through. We'll be very happy to answer them.

SPEAKER_01 32:04

Amazing. Thanks, Ash.

SPEAKER_00 32:08

Do I clap? Sorry, I the the it was on the slide, all I saw was a five minutes.