Yes.
Here's why.
Many landlords manage their own rental without the help of a professional. When I owned my own property management company, this was the profile of my typical new client: tried to manage the rental themselves, and at some point, usually after a costly learning experience, decided to hire a professional.
Here are the top 3 reasons to hire a property manager:
1. Rental rates - private landlords rarely do a good job pricing their monthly rent, and hardly ever successfully keep up with rent increases as the years go by. In a large majority of cases where my company signed a new client who had been managing themselves, we were able to bring enough of a rent increase to cover our entire management fee (usually more). So that private owner was actually doing all of the work themselves, and netting the same or less money before hiring a property manager.
2. Do you really want to handle maintenance? - a responsible landlord would literally have to be available every day, all hours. That means no vacation, no offline time on holidays, etc. In reality, many landlords just take their chances - this is a big risk with potential issues coming up that could threaten damage to the rental home or health and happiness of the resident. A good property manager is going to have processes in place to handle maintenance 24/7/365.
3. Do you know the law? - Landlords rarely have a good handle on the legal issues involved in renting a home, and those laws are changing around the country right now, especially in light of COVID (how well did you navigate through this if you had a problem tenant?). What if you get a warrant of habitability notice from your resident - do you know what to do and what timelines are required?
Selecting a property manager? Check out online reviews, get a good referral from someone you know, verify they are a member of NARPM, and make sure they have that ever important 24/7/365 maintenance process.
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