Updated January 13, 2022
If you’re curious about the title of this blog, let us clarify: we’re not saying it’s time for you to rent a home—but it might be time to rent YOUR home!
Relocating for work, retirement, or just for a change of scenery can be exciting. Choosing a new home and starting fresh in a new place—whether you leave Logan or stay local—should be a wonderful experience for you and your family.
What should you do about your former house? Before you can ultimately settle into a new place and life, you have some decisions to make about the home you’ll leave behind. Depending on the timing and the real estate market, selling your home could be the best option. However, if the market isn’t ideal—and you want to explore ways to make more money on your former home—turning it into a rental could be more profitable.
To rent or to sell? It’s an excellent question! Before you answer it, consider this insight from the best property management company Logan, Utah, offers.
When Selling Is the Best Option
If you want to move on from your house when you move out, selling could be the best option! Many people prefer the traditional option of selling one home when relocating to another.
When researching your options, make sure the market conditions won’t leave you in the hole after a sale. Depending on how long you’ve owned the house and how much you’ve put into it, selling at the wrong time can leave you at a financial loss. If you depend on the income from your home’s sale to put toward your new house, selling at a time when the market isn’t favorable can ruin your relocation plans.
What Affects an Ideal Home Sale?
Conditions don’t have to be perfect to make money from the sale of your house—but you want to analyze the potential financial situation before putting your home on the market. For example, it might not be a good idea to sell your Logan Utah home if:
- It’s overdue for renovations. Most homeowners want their home to look its best if they put it on the market. This means making some repairs and doing some upgrades. Depending on the severity of the damage or needed repairs, this can be a costly process. Some of the most common repairs made before a home is put up for sale include: repairing the roof, updating flooring, fixing plumbing or electrical problems, and updating the kitchen and bathrooms.
- You haven’t owned it long enough to build equity. Home equity is the difference between the fair market value and the outstanding balance of all mortgages and other liens on the property. It’s essentially a measure of how much of your home you own. The longer you own your home and the more consistently you make your mortgage payments, the more equity you’ll build up.
- The real estate market favors buyers. A buyer’s real estate market is where the seller has more power in the transaction. As a result, the seller is better positioned to negotiate, and the buyer may have to make multiple offers before one is accepted.
- You can’t sell it at your asking price. If there are more houses for sale than there are buyers, then your home will likely be worth less than what you’re asking for.
- You need to rush a sale. If you’re in a hurry, you could end up selling at a lower price than you need to make money. It might also be worth investing in some minor property upgrades to make your home more attractive to buyers.
A home sale doesn’t always happen right away. If your home is taking too long to sell, make sure your finances can support paying multiple mortgages and realtor-recommended upgrades to help your home sell at a better price.
When Turning Your Home Into a Rental Property Is the Best Option
If things look grim for a profitable home sale in Logan, consider turning your property into a rental! It could be the perfect time to become a property investor using the home you leave behind as your first rental property.
A property manager can advise that when the real estate market isn’t ideal, a rental property could be a more profitable solution. With a rental property, you earn long-term passive income as long as you operate the house as an investment property!
You Don’t Have to Do the Property Management Work
“But, a rental property seems like a lot of work!” You’re not wrong—it is!
There are a few reasons why it takes a lot of work to be a landlord. First, it takes a lot of time and effort to find good tenants and perform property maintenance your property. The longer it takes to find a tenant, the more the bills pile up for the landlord. Second, you’re responsible for fixing any damage your tenants do to the property. Finally, if your tenants don’t pay their rent, you may have to go through the hassle of evicting them.
That is a lot. However, there are options.
Choosing to turn your home into a rental property doesn’t require you to do any of the work or even manage it at all to generate a profit. By partnering with a professional property management company, real estate investors can hand of those tasks and let the experts handle every detail to generate monthly passive real estate income for you! This allows you to keep your focus on building a new life in your new home.
Whether it’s a short-term solution for your home until the market improves, or you decide you enjoy regular passive investment income, you don’t have to deal with the details of running a rental property business, dealing with renters, or handling the maintenance for the property.
If your home needs renovations, making it a rental property helps cover the costs of upgrades that can make your home more attractive to buyers when the time is right. Your property manager can oversee everything from helping you choose the best updates to coordinating professional contractors, then marketing and renting out the property.
Work With a Professional Property Management Company
Maybe you never considered being a rental property owner, but you might enjoy the perk of monthly rental income when you leave your home behind! Even if keeping a rental property isn’t your long-term goal, it could be the right decision for your home (and finances) when it’s time to move.
Choosing the right property management company is critical when turning your home into a rental! Reeder Asset Management can help you evaluate your home before you decide to rent or sell. Our experience in the Logan market gives insight into the income you could earn through a rental property.
Being a rental property owner isn’t for everyone—but our team can make it easy (and profitable)! We’re investors turned managers, so we know exactly how it feels to get started—and we can help! A great place to begin your journey is with a Free Property Management Assessment to see if our services are the right fit.