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You have a property, the tenant’s moving out in 60 days, you would like to get it rerented right away. Tenant’s moving out on, say, the 31st of July, you want to get it rerented on August 1st, so guess what, you need to show that property while that tenant is there. How do you do that? Some landlords say, “I write it right in the contract that they must cooperate, and if they don’t cooperate, we will evict them.” You can say that, but a friend of mine called me a few weeks ago and asked about this exact same thing. It’s actually the same friend that I talked about in a different video and I said, “You get more bees with honey.”
What is in it for the tenant to cooperate with showings? Nothing. Why do they care? Why do they want to keep their place extra clean and allow people to get in? There’s nothing in it for them. A couple of different ways to do that. One, if your existing tenant is in a lease and they’re asking to get out early, one of the tactics that I’ve used over the years is I’ll let you out early and I’ll give you your full security deposit back and I’ll let you out of the lease, but I need full cooperation on showings and we need four times a week that we’re going to show the property four blocks that way you’re not interrupting them all of a sudden and we’re going to have another video on that.
When I’ve done that, tenants have said, “No problem, I’ll show it.” Because remember, then the tenant’s motivated to get it rerented so they’re not on the hook. Now, let’s say tenant’s lease expires, you want to get it rerented the next day, which is what I talked about in the beginning. Motivate them. Give them a free week. Give them a free two weeks. You might be listening to this saying, “This guy is crazy.” No, I’m not crazy, well, maybe a little, but here’s the thing. You need to motivate them. What is in it for them? What’s going to cost you more, giving up a week or two or three or four of rent or giving up a couple of months?
If a lease expires up here in Massachusetts close to Boston July 31st, the tenant moves out, you can probably line up a tenant to move right in on August 15th, maybe August 1st, but if they move out, you’ve got to spruce the place up, and then you don’t get it on the rental market till August 10th. Sometimes you’d be lucky to get a tenant by September 1st. I’d say that’s a 50/50, but if you could start showing it in June when it’s expiring on July 31st, it helps you substantially, so motivate them. Make it easy on them, tell them you’ll give them a free week or two or three rent. Yes, you’re giving up a little money, but you’re getting the property rerented immediately. Try that, it works. Have a good one.