Managing rental properties on your own is great, until it gets exhausting. Charleston landlords often choose to self-manage properties instead of hiring an expert property manager who can do it for them, because they are unaware of the many things that it involves. However, this can lead to several challenges that hamper the growth of their business.
As experienced Charleston property managers, we’d like to walk you through some potential challenges of managing a rental by yourself to help you prepare for any eventuality.
1. Marketing The Charleston Property
The right marketing strategies can attract the best tenants to your unit. However, if you do not have a well-thought-out strategy in place, you could make some expensive mistakes. To effectively market the unit, you need to study the local advertising trends, explore the effective digital and offline tools and platforms, and work out a plan that best suits your type of property.
Other digital advertising challenges include keeping up with constantly evolving trends, mastering the different marketing platforms, and creating the required marketing assets to promote the place to the right audience.
2. Finding Quality Tenants in Charleston
It can be difficult to find quality tenants who can take good care of your rental and pay rent on time, especially in a rental market like Charleston, South Carolina, which has a considerable tenant pool. You’ll need to conduct a thorough screening process that includes multiple steps such as:
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- Setting rental criteria
- Drafting application forms
- Asking pre-screening questions
- Conducting thorough background checks
- Scheduling property showings
- Contacting previous landlords
For many independent landlords, it can be difficult to muster the necessary resources for crucial tasks like analyzing credit reports or doing criminal and eviction background checks.
3. Keeping Track of Maintenance
While managing a rental property on your own, you need to constantly check the maintenance issues and stay on your toes to respond to tenants’ requests. Hiring professional maintenance specialists for every issue can be too expensive, which is why many landlords end up making DIY fixes or hiring non-licensed contractors. This can lead to further issues and high operational costs as the work done is often of poor quality.
In the long run, inefficient maintenance can make the unit uninhabitable and result in prolonged vacancies. Therefore, we often recommend hiring a professional Charleston property manager as they can handle your asset on your behalf while keeping it up-to-code at all times.
4. Enforcing The Lease
Strong lease enforcement helps you protect your property from damages and motivates the tenants to use the home responsibly. However, it requires you to constantly keep an eye on the unit and ensure that the tenants:
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- Pay the rent and other extra charges like the pet fees and utility bills on time
- Follow the ‘pet-policy’ and ‘no-smoking policy’
- Report the maintenance issues on time
- Maintain the property
- Keeping up with the ‘quiet hours’
Failing to enforce the lease could lead to monetary losses, bothered neighbors, and unforeseen damages to the house.
5. Abiding By Complex Laws
Running a rental business requires you to follow several federal, state, and local laws, including:
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- Landlord-tenant laws
- Implied Warranty of Habitability
- State Rent Rules
- Security Deposit Limits
- Eviction Cause
- Fair Housing Laws
- Important Landlord Disclosures
Navigating these laws, staying informed about the latest developments, and executing them can be a hassle. Moreover, breach of any of the laws knowingly or unknowingly can lead to hefty penalties. The tenants can even sue you in the small claim courts.
Managing the rental property on your own can lead to some big-time losses and take away your peace of mind. We recommend hiring an experienced property management team in Charleston, like Meridian Residential Group, to handle your asset.
We have been in the real estate business for over 20 years and can make property management easy, 
stress-free, and, most importantly, profitable for you. We manage both single-family and multi-family properties in the Charleston, SC area, including in North Charleston, Summerville, Goose Creek, and Moncks Corner, among other cities.
For more information, contact us at Meridian Residential Group.
