Several cities across the U.S. have experienced an increase in renters. Even with the average unemployment rate at a 49-year low, the rate of homeownership has had a difficult time rebounding since the recession. More U.S. households are renting than at any point in the past 50 years. In our hometown of Denver, the number of renters has risen to almost 47%. In fact, Denver has the potential to soon join other large cities like Boston, LA, Miami, and New York City where renters outnumber homeowners.
Seeing that renters are on the rise, there’s a good chance several residents in your community are renting their homes. What do you have in place to keep track of owners and renters, and ensure you’re properly serving everyone in the community? Here are four things to take into consideration.
Are you keeping track of both tenants and owners?
Do you have a method in place to track who’s living in the homes in your community? More importantly, do you have a way to differentiate who owns each home, as well as who is renting? As an association or management company, it’s important that you have a simple, digital method for keeping track of who’s living in your community at any given point in time. This is vital to the safety and security of your community and simplifies the process of ensuring everything is up to code.
Are you including renters in community communications?
Renters are paying their hard-earned money to live in your community, so it’s important that they’re receiving the same level of service as homeowners. One thing to keep in mind is community communications, which ties into keeping track of who’s living in a home. Make sure your community communications are reaching renters as well as owners. Renters should be able to login to your community management software to read important bulletins concerning the community. They should also be on the distribution list for newsletters and other communications.
Do you have an easy method to reach out to owners?
It’s important to have a simple way to reach out to owners when needed. This is especially useful when you notice similar code violations throughout the community. Let’s say you’ve noticed that numerous yards in the community aren’t being properly maintained, and that these yards are primarily rental homes. In a tool like FRONTSTEPS, you can quickly send messages to groups of similar residents, alerting owners of the community rules and the impending fees they could face if the issue isn’t resolved.
Do you have specific rules in place regarding rentals?
Knowing that the number of renters across America is growing, it’s critical to account for these residents in your HOA bylaws. Be sure to create rules around rentals, for both homeowners and renters, to keep residents across the community happy. Never wait until an issue arises to develop rules. Be sure to have specific rules about full-time rentals, as well as short-term rentals and whether or not you allow them.
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