Do you use a letting agent to manage your properties or do you self manage?

I currently only use an agent to manage 2 of my properties as they are not long term tenancies and they are also over 1 hours drive away. I would hate to be driving over an hour each time the tenant has a problem or i have to show tenants around.

I think that using an agent for my whole portfolio is not required. They tend to charge about £50 per property per month (10 percent of the monthly rent) that would cost me over £2000 per month. A cost i cannot justify when most of my tenants never contact me or never needed anything from me.

What does a letting agent do?

I guess agents would help with the following:
Chasing the bad payers
Handle most of the mundane paperwork (tannancies, inventories etc)
Liase with workmen
Handle marketing and viewings of property.

I would appreciate someone else chasing bad payers, its not a nice thing to do, but luckly i dont have too many of these.

Doing most of the mundane paperwork would be nice although for £2000. I think i’ll do it myself for now.

I do not really use many workmen except for my trusted plumber, he really is a godsend. all I do is send him a list of all the jobs with the address and phone numbers. He completes them all and sends me the bill with no real interation or effort required by me.

As I mentioned most of my portfolio are on long term tenancies therefore I would not really need help with viewings / marketing.

I guess for the cost I don’t mind doing it myself at the moment. But as I buy more property i guess it will be harder for me to self manage. Even when I have 100 properties though, I don’t think i will use an agent. for the amount of money an agent would cost I could employ somebody to manage my portfolio for me. Next year after my wedding my wife will be working with me full time. I hope she likes paperwork!

I think anybody investing in property should try to self manage their properties if they have the time. Then they will understand and maybe appreciate the work that a letting agent does.

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