Are your tenants going to renew their lease and stay in your rental property when their present lease term expires? Keeping high-quality tenants in your North Carolina rental properties begins with good management. Now is an excellent time to review lease terms and follow-up with tenants to find out whether they are going to renew, but landlords should be thinking about tenant retention all year long. Let’s take a look at a few tips to improve lease renewal rates using a tenant retention strategy.
Tenant Retention Benefits Landlords
How do lease renewals benefit landlords? Simply put, vacant rental properties do not generating income, and it is costly when properties turn over. Advertising and marketing to find new tenants to replace high-quality tenants costs landlords time and money. Then once you start receiving rental applications, you must spend more time using a thorough tenant screening process to hopefully find tenants as good as the ones who did not renew their lease. Then there are lease negotiations, property preparation costs, security deposit management, and more. Turnovers happen, but they are costly and put pressure on the property. It makes sense to minimize turnovers.
To avoid losing rental income and spending time and money finding new tenants, landlords should focus on keeping the good ones. Landlords with an active tenant retention strategy will not only minimize vacancies but will also help retain good tenants who pay rent on time and take care of your rental units. Here are a few tips for putting a strategy in place for your rental homes in North Carolina.
Communicate with Tenants and Address Issues Promptly
Prompt responses and open communication are essential to creating a positive tenant and landlord relationship and a major part of retaining tenants. In the context of a tenant retention strategy, landlords should implement a communication plan which makes it easy and convenient for tenants to report any issues they may be having with the property they are renting. When there is a maintenance issue or repair request, have a system in place to respond promptly, address issues with professional vendors and make repairs as soon as possible.
Keep Rental Properties In Top Condition
If you want to increase the likelihood of lease renewals from high-quality tenants, then you need to maintain a high-quality rental property. Landlords should develop and put in place a year-round maintenance plan which addresses preventative maintenance, unexpected problems, and property repairs. Along with this plan, landlords need to work with a team comprised of top-notch, professional service providers. One common landlord mistake is to scrimp on repairs, alienating tenants and disincentivizing them from renewing, which ends up being far more costly than it would have been to handle repairs well in the first place.
Rent Payment Options and Tenant Surveys
Offer your tenants multiple rent payment options (e.g. online payment, direct deposit, mailing checks, etc.) as part of your tenant retention strategy. And here’s a bonus tip for landlords: Convenient, 24/7 online rent payment options have been shown to reduce late rent payments. Along with payment options, create and use a tenant survey to ask tenants questions about their rental experience (parking, noise, maintenance, service professionals, etc.). Use the tenant feedback to look for ways to improve the rental experience and increase lease renewals.
The above lease renewal tips for landlords will help you minimize vacancies in your North Carolina rental properties. If you have questions about improving your lease renewal rates or creating a tenant retention strategy, contact us.
