Rental Appraisal

Contact us for a free rent appraisal. This is a great starting place to get an idea of how much rent your property may be able to achieve. We can also take the time to sit down with you and discuss any questions you may have about owning a rental property, the rental market in nelson and how we manage property.  We can visit your property at a time that suits you or; if it’s one you’re looking at buying we can give you a desktop appraisal from real estate advertising – we can even do this for a variety of properties to help you make an informed decision.

Just email Tonia or phone her on 021 081 77097

We also offer a free rental attractiveness report to help you understand how attractive a property is in the Nelson rental market. We can also  suggest steps that can be taken to make a property more attractive to our tenants, or potentially increase your rental yield. 

Property Preparation

We present a property in the way we expect it returned to us – spotlessly clean with tidy gardens and everything fully working. We can advise, recommend tradespeople, and arrange any work if you want. If our property manager finds anything that needs to be attended to, they will contact you immediately to get it sorted.

Meth Baseline Test

We are Certified Meth Samplers with Meth Solutions. This means you can now opt for getting your property Baseline Tested at the beginning and end of each tenancy at reasonable price. This serves as a deterrent to tenants, and allows us, the Tenancy Tribunal, and Insurers, to hold the tenant accountable.

For tenants it shows the property is safe and clear of Meth contamination – an increasingly popular expectation.

Tenant Screening

Thorough tenant screening is at the core of our management process; by getting this right we minimise the issues arising during and after the tenancy. Every adult tenant must apply separately and pass extensive background checks – after all we are guaranteeing the rent and want you to stay with us! The reference checks include employers, current and previous property managers, private landlords, and character references.

Checks include credit checks, social media searches, tenancy tribunal records, and other database searches.
We look for people that have proven they hold themselves to a high standard, particularly in the areas of cleanliness, tidiness, honesty, and reliability. They must also have the financial ability to maintain the rent long term so we look at income to rent ratio.

These thorough background searches gives us a real in-depth idea of the prospective tenants’ character and background meaning we can make a truly informed decision about who to trust with your asset.

Tenant Moves In

Prior to the move in date we carry out a thorough ingoing inspection of the property, taking hundreds of photos to record of the state of the property. We also note any small maintenance issues and will take samples for a meth test if the property is meth managed. We provide this, along with tenancy documents, on a USB stick to tenants and have them sign a picture of their collected so we can refer back to this at a later date. From here we ask tenants to take some time to look through the inspection to confirm this is the state they received the property in.

Inspections

We carry out our first routine inspection six weeks into the tenancy. This is a great opportunity for us to touch base with the tenants and ensure that everything is running smoothly and that the home is being lived in carefully and correctly. This also provides us a chance to communicate clearly with tenants our expectations for the care of the property and any areas which require improvement to set high standards from the outset.

After this we carry out inspections every 13 weeks as required by insurance companies. This is a great opportunity for tenants to communicate any minor maintenance issues that may have arisen. At the inspections we pay particular attention to any maintenance issues especially around dampness. Again, we do ensure that tenants are taking adequate care of the property and follow up if necessary.  We provide you, the owner a photographic report of the inspection along with a short written report.

Property Maintenance

We aim to ensure that properties do not fall into disrepair. Our approach to managing this is based on both the property manager and tenant reporting any issues that may be of concern. We believe it is our duty to report all issues and help our owners work within their budgets to keep the property in the best condition possible.

We request that tenants inform us of any maintenance required as soon as they notice it and not make the issue worse. Tenants submit maintenance requests via an app or a website including a picture – it’s very useful seeing the problem.

Once an issue is identified we will either send a work order to a trusted contractor or send it on to you for approval depending on the instructions you have given us. At this stage you can opt to do the work yourself, request a quote, approve or decline the request or ask that we defer the work until a later date. The goal is to have issues addressed in a timely manner. This keeps tenants on side as well as protecting the property.

Our contractors give us fantastic service and a considerable discount on invoices. We do not accept any incentives from our contractors.

Water or Gas Charges

If you have a water meter dedicated to the property we read the meter at each inspection including a photo record. We then charge the tenant for water used at council rates since the last reading and pass the proceeds on to you. You pay your council water bills. We ask tenants to voluntarily add $5-$10 per week to their rent that we keep separate and use for water only.This means that we can pay you quickly after taking the reading.

If you have gas bottles then they need to be provided full at the start, and will be left full at end of tenancy at the tenant’s expense. The law requires that the cost of any bottle rental is covered by owners while tenants pay for the gas they use.

Tenants Move Out

At the end of each tenancy we do an outgoing inspection and a meth test if meth managed. We carefully compare this inspection to the ingoing inspection and follow up to ensure any damage is repaired at tenants cost as per the Residential Tenancies Act. We read the water meters, check that all keys are returned, that the property is clean and tidy, gardens free of weeds and lawns mowed. Once we are certain that the property has been returned as it should be and final costs are settled the bond will be refunded.

Communicating with you

We believe that transparency is always the best option so we will be honest with you even if this requires telling you something that you may not want to hear. We aim to provide owners of properties regular updates and plenty of information without overwhelming them. As we get to know and build a relationship with you we learn whether you like to know every single detail or just the highlights, and do our best to tailor our service to you.

Communicating with Tenants

It’s important to keep the lines of communication open by treating tenants, their home, and issues they raise with respect. We aim to develop positive working relationships so when issues arise there is minimal stress to all parties.

Resolving Conflict

From time to time conflict does occur. Bolitho’s strategy is to treat all parties with respect and ensure that everything we do is within the law. We listen to all sides and do our best to find a resolution that is fair and reasonable for all parties.