I can't remember who all is in this situation, and I can't find the post.
I'm meeting with a property management company guy today to rent out my house when it's time to move to Texas. It sounds like a decent deal, as far as if I have to rent it. They keep the first month's rent as a set up fee and charge $75 a month to collect rent, schedule maintenance, etc. Maintenance issues have a 15% service fee added on to the parts cost for labor. They charge $150 to execute a lease renewal each year with the tenant. And I just have to keep $500 in a maintenance fund for repairs.
They have to come out to my house to tell me what I need to do to make it marketable and what I can rent it for, but I probably won't do that for a few weeks. I've got a bunch of projects I know need completed through the spring, so it'll be interesting to see what else they see.
I'm really nervous about doing it, but it's well worth $75 a month to have them take on the headache of collecting rent, issuing late notices, taking care of maintenance, etc. since I'm going to be 1300 miles away.
Just thought I'd give you all an update in case you were curious on how it all works through a company if you don't want to tke on being a landlord full time. I honestly thought it would cost a couple hundred a month, so I was pleasantly surprised to hear how little it costs.
They didn't have you where I come from...never knew the best was yet to come...