It’s been a year since we started this journey. We have bought two of our eventual ten houses and it feels like we are on track to hit our long term goals. But the end of the first year also brought a new milestone: our first tenant turnover.

Now ideally we would have tenants who stayed for more than a year and we won’t have tenant turnover every 12 months. However, in this case, it may be for the best. The first house we bought was in Canton, Ohio. It rented pretty quickly, although the tenants moved in the middle of the month so it was prorated. That seems to be where our luck ended with this house.

Almost every month, we had at least one $100 maintenance charge. Some of them I disputed with the property management, but that really added to my headache. It culminated in a $600 charge the last month. This appears to have been plumbing issues which is considered our responsibility. All of these costs really cut into our cashflow.

Hopefully, this was a tenant issue and not a house issue. We won’t find out until we get new tenants, but we at least are optimistic these monthly charges will go away. If the charges continue to eat into our bottom line, we might have to reconsider our long term goals regarding this particular home. It is worth noting that our Massillon property has been rented for three months and has only one small maintenance charge. We have already agreed that I get to pick all future homes (since, at least so far, my pick is the better performer).

A little more about the turnover. Overall, it cost $1000 to get the house ready to rent again. Everything they fixed was considered regular wear and tear so, other than unpaid utilities, the tenants walked away with their full security deposit. I’m not sure I fully agree with the wear and tear part but the property management assured me that in Ohio, we could not ask for more. They did a video of the state of the house and then sent a list of the repairs that would be made. Once I agreed to the cost, they got to work.

As of today, it has been sent back to leasing. I am pretty impressed with how quickly the turn around happened. I believe it was 10 days from the tenants handing in the keys to the unit being sent to leasing. So, now I am just asking for three (small) things: 1. It gets rented quickly by 2. Less accident-prone tenants who 3. Stay for more than a year. Is that too much?