How to Find a Good Tenant in Tampa, Florida
The most important thing you can do to ensure you have a successful experience as a landlord is to put a good tenant in your rental property. How do you find that tenant in Tampa? There are three specific things we recommend that will help you find a highly qualified tenant.
The first thing is to broadly advertise your property.
In an earlier blog, I recommended some of the top sites you should be on in Tampa to reach renters. You have to advertise online to give your property the most exposure to potential tenants.
Respond quickly to leads
Next, you have to be responsive. When leads come in from your advertising, whether it’s a phone call or an email or today even a lead from social media, you have to be timely in your response. A recent situation of ours can illustrate that point. We had a property for rent in South Tampa, near MacDill Air Force Base. On Saturday morning, a potential renter saw our advertising and sent an email. Within an hour, our leasing agent responded and by lunchtime, they were talking. The property was shown in the afternoon and the people really liked it. They filled out an application and submitted it to us by late afternoon on Saturday. We did all the background checking on Sunday and were able to get the tenants approved that day. On Monday, the tenants came to our office with their security deposit.
The process moved very quickly because of our response time. What we found most interesting is that later in the week, when those tenants were back in our office signing the lease, they told us that they had responded to a lot of ads that they saw that Saturday morning, but we were the only ones who responded back to them that same day. On Monday and Tuesday, they started hearing from landlords and property managers, but by that time they were already off the market. This shows you how important it is to respond to leads right away.
Always do a thorough background check.
Screening tenants properly will ensure you get a good one in your Tampa rental home.
If you have any questions about how to find a great tenant for your property, contact us or give us a call if we can answer any questions at (813) 875-7474.