Increasing the value of your rental property means getting the most rent out of your property that you can. Not unlike buyers, renters select where they live based on emotion. They make decisions based on how they feel when they are in a property.

At Aborn Properties, we often take over the rental process when an owner has tried but not succeeded. One of the complaints I get most often from owners is that prospective tenants keep standing them up when they schedule a showing. Then, I arrive at the rental property and I notice the grass is high, the shrubs are dead and the front of the house is in desperate need of painting. What’s happened is that once the owner gives the address to a potential tenant, the tenant will drive by the property and decide not to come back. Make sure the curb appeal is working for you instead of against you. It matters when tenants are driving by and looking at the house from the outside.

The quality and the quantity of tenants you attract has a lot to do with how much you are charging for rent, but also with how the tenants feel when they are inside the house. I hear owners promise to paint walls between the next set of tenants, and sometimes they will request that I find them tenants who don’t care about the condition of the paint on the walls. One thing I want you to remember is that tenants who do not care about the condition of your property before they move in are not going to care about keeping up your property, or taking good care of it while they are living there. Anyone who will put up with a property that is not clean and sharp will not work very hard to make it clean and sharp at the time of move out.

You also need to remember who makes the rental choice. In families, it is almost always women. Women looking for homes want a clean kitchen and clean bathrooms. They will notice these details and it has been our experience that women who keep a nice clean house will not mind cleaning up their own dirt, but they do not want to be left cleaning up dirt from a previous tenant. Make sure the house looks and shows the way you would want it to look for your own family.

If you want to ask a higher price, you have to give tenants a property to be proud of. That’s the best way to increase your rental value. If you have any questions about how to price your property or get more rent out of it, please contact us at Aborn Properties.