Owner FAQs

There are several factors that play into how quickly a property rents. First, is the property vacant or occupied. Vacant properties tend to rent sooner than occupied properties. Second, is the condition of the property. When a property is clean, painted and ready for the next occupant, it is a lot easier to visualize oneself in the home. Third, is market demand. Currently, the rental market is hot, therefore the average days on market is about 25. Some homes rent within 72 hours of coming on the market while others take 30-days to rent.

Yes, we are licensed by the Department of Real Estate.

Yes, we can! You will receive your money within 24-48 business hours after we receive the rent from the resident.

As your property management company, we handle all the lease preparation and execution. We will send you a signed copy of the lease for your records.

Rent is due between the 1st and the 5th of the month. Once the rent is received in our office, we will process it and send it to you electronically within 24-48 business hours, if you have signed up for this method of payment. If not, then a check will be mailed to you.

Residents can remit payment in several ways including CashPay at designated locations, online payments, or via cashier’s check or money order.

Our leases are typically 12 months in length. Occasionally, we will have a resident that needs a 6-month lease, however, we will contact you first.

We charge 120% of the rent as the security deposit. We charge an additional deposit of $250 per pet up to 2 pets.

We can start managing your property as soon as you sign the contract. Start to finish, the process takes about 48-business hours.

We specialize in single-family homes,condos,multifamily & retail

You can access your account 24/7 via your online portal. In your portal you will find the monthly newsletter, your accounting statement, any violations that may have been issued to your resident, and more.

Management One holds the security deposit as long as we manage the property in a non-interest-bearing trust account. Upon the resident moving out, we will disperse the deposit based on the condition of the property.

We require all the keys, at least two sets of them, at the initial inspection. We also recommend that you keep a set of keys as well. Once the property is leased, we will keep one set at our office. If the tenant decides to “re-key” the property for their personal security, it is done at their expense and they must provide two sets of the keys to us. We will then forward you one set. If the property is in a homeowner’s association with community features that require a key, this must be provided to the tenant as well. It is commonplace for a key to a community pool to be “do not duplicate” in which case we would collect a key fee as well.

Many of our owners are out of the area and even live out of state. You can mail your keys and documentation to our main operations office. If you don’t feel comfortable mailing your keys, you may leave them with a neighbor or friend.

Once we have a fully executed contract, keys, and taken the photos, we are ready to go. If there is a tenant in the property, we will work out showing instructions with them. It is ideal if the property is vacant. Most prospective tenants are looking for a property 3 to 4 weeks before their lease expires or living arrangements change, so we recommend having the property on the market 3 to 4 weeks before it can be occupied by a new tenant.

Your tenant will pay a monthly lease to you. We charge a few fees to the tenants in certain circumstances:

• Application Fee – Every adult intending to reside in your property will pay a $35 application fee. Upon request, they are given this report which they can use for other properties should they be denied to occupy your property.
• Pet Screening Fee – If the tenant has a pet, we require they screen their pet, comfort animal or service animal through this third party company. For $25, the pet is screened (comfort or service animals are free, but documentation is required) and rated for your property. The tenant receives a link so they can provide this same information (vaccines, photos, microchip, address) to other service providers (veterinarians, daycare, groomers, etc.).
• Initial Lease Administration Fee – The fee to process the rental application, screen applicants, execute the contract and conduct the move-in is $95.
• Tenant Legal Liability Fee – We require every tenant to have liability insurance or renter’s insurance. If they opt for our third party tenant liability insurance, they will pay $12.50 monthly for $100,000 of coverage with no deductible.
• Lease Breakage Fee – If a tenant decides to break the lease early, we will charge them a $750 Lease Breakage Fee. This offsets our cost to prepare the property for lease, secure a new tenant and have the property re-occupied. It is meant to discourage tenants from breaking leases.
• Posting Fee – If we must post a “3-Day Notice to Quit or Pay Rent” or a “3-Day Notice to Quit or Cure” we charge the tenant $25 to post this notice at your property.
• Lease Renewal Fee – Should you decide to renew a lease, we charge the tenant $100 to inspect the property, negotiate the new terms and execute a lease addendum.
• Tenant Replacement Fee – If the tenants want to replace one roommate or tenant with another, we require the new tenant to apply and qualify. If they qualify, we will amend the original lease and charge the old tenant a $250 fee for the additional work.
• Additional Unauthorized Tenant Fee – If without our approval or permission, a tenant adds an additional person to the property, we will require that person to apply and qualify to live in your rental, and we will increase the monthly lease $100.

For most of our rentals, we use the MLS to receive maximum exposure. This fee is included in your management fee or as part of the tenant acquisition fee. If an owner requests we spend additional money marketing, for example, paid advertising in Rent.com, that fee would be passed on to the owner.

We offer a Rental Guarantee. If we do not secure a tenant within 3 weeks after the initial marketing, we will waive our first month’s management fee. This assumes a prospective tenant meets our minimum qualifying guidelines (minimum FICO score of 625, minimum verified gross income at least 3 times the monthly rent and a clean rental/mortgage history for the previous 12 months).

We use a ‘Better Tenant System’ and look for the following: verifiable income at least 3 times the monthly rent, previous rental history, a criminal background check, and we look at their credit. We are not looking for perfect credit, but a credit history without numerous collection accounts, recent late payments, or a large number of credit cards with high limits.

We have a sister company, First Home real estate LLC , that can handle small jobs on your property. We find that outside handymen pursue the biggest jobs first, and in good economic times, cherry pick their job requests. First home is priced competitively, can be there quickly, guarantees their work, and will always provide an estimate before commencing with any work.