The Insider's Guide to Exceptional Real Estate Management with Expert Laura Baron

Unlock the secrets of thriving in the real estate business with our latest podcast episode, featuring Laura Baron from All County Denver Metro Property Management. Laura, with her extensive experience, sheds light on the delicate dance of managing rental properties and the pivotal role of developing a robust business culture. She articulates how personal values are not just buzzwords but the actual foundation of a successful enterprise and underlines the importance of partnering with landlords who share those values. Get ready to learn about the finesse of setting authentic rental prices and attracting premium tenants, all while maintaining properties that stand out in the market.

During our thorough conversation with Laura, we dissect the complexities of efficiently handling a sprawling portfolio of properties. I weave in my perspectives on the necessity of solid systems and delineated team roles, unpacking how these elements contribute to a seamless operational flow. You'll discover the impact of utilizing cutting-edge technology to bolster communication and organization within the team. We also discuss the strategic benefits of outsourcing maintenance to ensure sincerity with property owners and the overall efficacy in property management.

For investors on the prowl for a property management guru, the insights shared by Laura are a treasure trove. The episode zeros in on the critical factors to consider when enlisting a property manager, from fee transparency to the paramountcy of communication. Moreover, we delve into the emotional relief and professional perks of hiring a property manager compared to the daunting task of self-managing rental properties. For those eager to engage with Laura's expertise, she extends an invitation to connect directly through a call or via her website. Tune in to our enlightening series 'Break Your Golden Handcuffs,' with episodes available every Monday and Thursday, for further eye-opening discussions.

More info @ www.allcountyds.com

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Hey everybody, david McElwain with another episode of Brick of Golden Handcuffs. Super excited to have a friend of mine and compatriot in the real estate business, laura Barron. Laura is the owner of a company called All-County Property Management in Denver. It's actually I screwed it up, laura. What's the name of the company in?

Speaker 2: 0:25

Denver. It's actually I screwed it up more what's the name of the company? Well, so it's actually all County Denver Metro and I am a South division.

Speaker 1: 0:31

So what that means for those of you who don't, that don't live in Denver or the area is that she handles about half of the city. There's a North and the South yeah, I handled Denver Metro. That's right, she actually started all County. Um, as that's right, she actually started All County as a mother with two young children trying to implement her own strategic business model in combination with the franchisee support as an expert in the field for multifamily at the medium size of less than 50 units of building and primarily focuses on single family rental as a property management company.

Speaker 1: 1:14

Laura, welcome to the show.

Speaker 2: 1:16

Thank you, very honored.

Speaker 1: 1:18

Yeah. So I always ask my guests this show is called Brick of Golden Handcuffs. So have you ever had golden handcuffs? Well, so explain to me more. Yeah, well, you know, golden handcuffs are that idea that you want to leave but you're tied to your employer for one of many reasons and the tie to the employer is so strong that cutting that tie is painful in some way, like for me. I was a sales executive. Where I had to, I wanted to leave but I was making too much money. Or you know, if you're a tech guy and your options don't vest for five years and if you leave, it costs you $300,000. Those are bad things. Some folks have had them, some folks haven't had them.

Speaker 1: 2:01

I just always been curious had them.

Speaker 2: 2:06

Some folks haven't had them. I just always been curious, yeah, like, um, definitely, I definitely have felt that way. I feel like the um, creative, um driver, business driver. I feel like the personality of my business, yeah, yeah, and I lead the culture and yeah, so without me, things change drastically really fast.

Speaker 1: 2:24

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:25

That's fascinating.

Speaker 1: 2:27

So Laura is a small business owner and, generally speaking, this podcast has been focused on how people can make money in alternative investment forms. But I think one of the alternative investments that we don't talk about as much because it's not as sexy is owning a single rental, or owning three or four rentals, or owning your own business. So tell me you said that culture starts with you as a small business owner how did you learn that lesson?

Speaker 2: 2:59

You know, it's probably just my intuition, like I just kind of know that, um, you know, our culture is very value oriented and a follow through is huge for me. Honesty is huge for me. Having a certain value system, just I have to have it in my business, I have to have it reflected to me and my employees and really my people I partner with in terms of landlords. Yeah, Fascinating. So you know, like-minded is really really important. Like-minded landlords, so I bet you have some horror stories about property owners.

Speaker 1: 3:35

What is a good indication to you that this is a property owner that you do not want to do business with?

Speaker 2: 3:43

Probably someone with unrealistic expectations. So maybe they got themselves into a really expensive mortgage and they've got an arm and maybe their 3% interest rate buy down matured and all of a sudden they've got this balloon payment and they're wanting pushing me to rent something over market because they absolutely have to right Now. It doesn't mean that we don't get top of market, because we do. We use professional photography, we use syndication websites, we tap dance when we do showings. We do everything we can possibly do. However, the market always sets the price. It means that in sales as much as it does in rentals. So I would say probably an unrealistic owner would be someone who wants sky's the limit when the market is really saying something else.

Speaker 1: 4:31

Now, as an owner, obviously I teach up for that question so that if you own, if you're a listener and you own something, you know what not to do. Yeah, how, how? As an owner, as you start this process, let's say you just bought a property and you're starting to, you know, you know you don't want to do it yourself and you want to hire a property manager how do you know what realistic rents really are?

Speaker 2: 4:55

Well, so definitely the market will. Um, what's available around your zip code, what's available around your block? Um, we can pull up reports about what's been rented in your area. So we take square footage, room size, condition, location all of those factors set the price and really any sort of deferred maintenance that they've been let go. This also leads into your realistic owner is that they do not let their properties have too much deferred maintenance. Um, you know it's a, it's a sellable thing, just like a product is. You know you want your rental to reflect the type of renter that you want. Um, so, yeah, so you know all of those things go into dictating the rental analysis and and over the years I've gotten really good at it.

Speaker 1: 5:45

Yeah, what kind of things do you spot instantly that tell you how to manipulate, or inform, rather, the rental analysis? I had a guy on the show recently who is a mobile park owner or a mobile home investor and he has a very specific tenant he likes, and he likes a blue collar laborer who works in the trades because that person will fix his property and he loves that tenant base. And so I just wonder what informs your rental market thought process when you see something?

Speaker 2: 6:26

thought process when you see something well. So we have a lot of um single family homes that are very nice. They're like over 600 000 some of them, you know which would be at the average.

Speaker 1: 6:34

In denver. The marketplace average is about 500 grand for a single family home. So this is a 25 improvement over the norm for the marketplace for, yeah, everybody in the other market.

Speaker 2: 6:45

Yeah, yeah. And so obviously credit matters, you know I would not say that we have a certain subset of clients or tenants we go after, but you know we have to look at the whole picture without discriminating and we really want someone who looks really solid, and so good credit matters, you know, making enough monthly rent to be able to cover the mortgage or the rental per month. And then also background. You know, even if there's just a hint of violent background, you probably don't want that tenant because it means that they're going to argue with your neighbors, you know, or they're going to argue with each other. And so we really want to be careful about picking people who are, um, who've not had the best background, and especially um, when it comes to domestic violence or any type of violence, is we we try to steer around that? Yeah?

Speaker 1: 7:42

Yeah, Cause your theory is that behave like that once you're going to behave like that again. Is that what I'm hearing?

Speaker 2: 7:46

Like we see it all, so I didn't even know it was a thing. But there actually is a. There's a term that you can get arrested for, and it's called bar brawling. Bar brawling Let me see.

Speaker 1: 7:59

Does this mean you're in a bar fight?

Speaker 2: 8:02

Yeah. So, and we've seen a few tenants that it's like they're repeat offenders, that they bar brawl and so like. That is probably not a great fit for us. You know, I need you to not punch holes in the walls and start fights with the neighbors, you know.

Speaker 1: 8:17

Yeah, those are not good tenants to have, because then inherently they create other problems, right?

Speaker 2: 8:22

Yeah, but we are just so lucky to live where we live in terms of, you know, we're a very well you know, educated, in terms of, you know, responsible people. We have such a good group to pull from in the Denver Metro overall, and you know, really, and not to speak out of turn but renting has become more in vogue than buying, you know, and so, again, we're just very fortunate. Investors are very fortunate because they have one of the best pools of tenants to choose from, and that's where we're so lucky and I feel so fortunate to be in property management where we are. So that's fascinating.

Speaker 1: 8:59

Renters are now in vogue, and I've seen this trend in the Pacific Northwest, I've seen it in Southern California, I've seen it on all the major coasts, where the cost of tenancy is less than the cost of homeownership.

Speaker 2: 9:14

Yep.

Speaker 1: 9:15

I saw something recently where the forecast is that it will stay this way for the next five to seven years, based on where the Fed is suggesting that interest rates stay when it's all about us out somewhere in the 5% fund-to-funds rate. Yeah, definitely, and so as an investor. We all are driven by supply and demand, and if renting is in vogue, doesn't? That mean we're going to have more demand for our product than we do supply, or do you see something else happening here?

Speaker 2: 9:51

You know, I just don't know. I think generations play into the market's ebb and flow. You know, and I do know, that almost half of the real estate is owned by a boomer generation, you know. So it'll be interesting over the years to see how that unfolds. I think right now we're just in a little pinch, you know, in terms of um, you still have millennials and boomers competing after the same thing too. So that is just kind of kind of where I see it, I guess.

Speaker 1: 10:24

But so the boomer and the millennial are competing. Are they competing as tenants or are they competing as landlords?

Speaker 2: 10:31

So they are competing as home buyers? Okay yeah, and they each have different agendas and there is a ratio of people yes, they need a home, but they're also boomers, or sometimes on their second or third investments, you know.

Speaker 1: 10:51

And because of that it's different, different agendas. Right. And if the boomers are in the third? The boomers on their third investment, what's the difference in their agenda versus the millennials agenda?

Speaker 2: 11:03

Well, yeah, there are more landlords.

Speaker 1: 11:05

Okay, so it's really about buying it for the return on the money and the millennials is to use as a primary residence.

Speaker 2: 11:12

Absolutely yeah.

Speaker 1: 11:13

And so from your chair. What does that do to the housing market in general?

Speaker 2: 11:19

Well, it just does. It definitely makes it tight. It's driving still up that sales price, limited inventory and then people just don't want to hassle with it and they just rather rent.

Speaker 1: 11:30

Yeah. So you know Nash, nationwide we have seen tons of stats in every part of the country that says there's a housing shortage. It doesn't matter where you sleep at night, it seems like there's somewhat of a housing shortage. It seems like there's somewhat of a housing shortage. What do you think is going to change in the environment to lessen that housing shortage? To get to oversupply, Do you?

Speaker 2: 11:58

see anything in the near term changing, not in the near term.

Speaker 1: 12:02

Okay, medium to long term, anything on?

Speaker 2: 12:03

your horizon? Yeah, maybe medium to long term. You know, aging out of homes will be interesting. Tell me more about that. Well, I just again, I think boomers are going to um. There will be a shift, you know, um, when they age into assisted living or pass on, and it will be interesting what they do with their homes, whether or not they sell to subsidize their care, or if they're leaving it to junior, or what they're going to do with their investments, because I think the stats are that they genuinely own half of the real estate.

Speaker 1: 12:40

Yeah, and that's tremendous, right. And a lot of them are aging in place more than they ever have before, right, and a lot of them are aging in place more than they ever have before, right. And a lot of them are unwilling to downsize because they have either paid for the property or the cost of service to the debt is so small that it's not affordable for them. And so that silver tsunami that you're talking about, do you think it's a 10-year horizon, a 15-year horizon?

Speaker 2: 13:08

Maybe, 15. Maybe 15.

Speaker 1: 13:11

And if you're an investor, what do you do to prep for that?

Speaker 2: 13:16

I guess you would save right, Save and plan, you know. Put your money in Bitcoin, I don't know.

Speaker 1: 13:23

I'm not really a Bitcoin fan, so I'm not going to go.

Speaker 2: 13:26

I'm not either. But yeah, you know, you never know, there are other things. Maybe you become an influencer for now.

Speaker 1: 13:34

Right, you know it's interesting. As we talk about housing supply and property management, I wonder what have you learned as a property management around managing so many doors? I don't remember the number you have, but I know you have a high number of doors that you manage and you can't do this just by yourself. So I'd love to hear how a successful property management company actually functions when you have so many doors that you're responsible for.

Speaker 2: 14:03

Yeah, yeah. So systems and processes are absolutely 100%. They have to be in place, they have to be non-negotiables and they have to be what's in your lane, whoever's in that lane. It has to be rehearsed, rehearsed, rehearsed again, right? So in order, in other words, the way that we divide our lanes is, we have different team members who are in charge of different lanes and their lane is very spelled out. So basically, they come in and it's plug and play. They can check into their job, they do their lane, they focus on their lane.

Speaker 2: 14:42

We use a lot of technology and we use our own like cloud based software to keep hold of communication. So systems, processes, communication and having team members know exactly their lane and always educating them, and then really value system comes in again. You know, I want someone on my team who understands me and I understand them and we can communicate really well, so they can communicate well to our owners and our tenants. Because when those systems and processes are in place and you're communicating, you get this symbiotic sort of workforce, you know, and you do get as an some benefit of a job where you know exactly what's expected. So we are just really big on giving direction, giving clear expectations and then talking about communication and also keeping ourselves accountable as business owners.

Speaker 2: 15:43

And you know I do have some golden handcuffs here, but I do hold myself very accountable in terms of I will jump in to whatever lane um if my employee or my team member doesn't feel confident or is unsure, um, or need some guidance and I'm a very strong team. Lead in that way, um. And then the value system thing it's just a non-negotiable lead in that way. And then the value system thing it's just a non-negotiable yeah. So it means that when you are here, you're present, there's no drama, you get to work, but you're happy and kind and you're honest, and it's just very, very important.

Speaker 1: 16:19

That's awesome, so just curious what are the lanes you've laid out?

Speaker 2: 16:25

Yep. Well, so we have like a front desk admin and she handles leasing. So, like the incoming calls will come in about leasing, she's already got her portfolio in front of her for available vacancies and she can answer calls and tell you about listings that are available. She can direct calls but then in her spare time she does leasing. So she'll write leases, she'll help us coordinate and follow up on payments and then another chair might be the maintenance person. So there's a maintenance team lead.

Speaker 2: 17:03

She handles we have something called our property meld. A meld is a property maintenance request and literally her job is to babysit that. She also, so she doesn't get into this monotonous cycle. She also does move out inspections and those are always fun because she gets to take a tally. She gets to go by herself, takes the company car, she'll do inspections, the move out inspections, and she's awesome at it. But then she can also come back and redirect the vendors to what they need to repair or fix. And then she reports to John who does security deposits, and she'll say this is the security deposit damage deposition and she'll direct him on that. So then you have John's chair, which is really escalations and security deposits and he keeps an eye on some reconciliations and basically, when there's an eviction or something needs to go to court or we're having a hard time discerning a contract, that is John's chair and he's actually CFO of the company.

Speaker 2: 18:04

So then we have Jake, who's a runner, and then we have Brandon who's a runner, and then we have Brandon who's a runner, and so the runners are actually more important than you think, because we're always running around. They do inspections, they do showings, they pick up lock boxes, they drop flowers, they meet the photographer, you know, they might meet the tenant for something, they might follow up on repair work. So they're kind of like boots on the ground, eyes in the field. And again, everything goes into a cloud-based system. So we always follow up as owners. We look into our inspection cloud system. So we look through inspections, we always kind of keep tabs on our properties and we been doing this for a while, you know. So I mean we've honed our processes and you know it took about seven years for us to just really get it.

Speaker 1: 18:53

Yeah, and to kind of get to a smooth position. So, uh, kind of curious. You mentioned the mail which is your maintenance orders. Do you actually have maintenance staff as employees or do you outsource all that stuff?

Speaker 2: 19:05

No, Yep, we outsource all of it. Um, to me it's a conflict of interest to run a business within a business. Um, I just don't want to get caught up in that.

Speaker 1: 19:15

So the conflict is that you would, I assume, repair something and then charge them for the repair. Is that what the conflict is?

Speaker 2: 19:23

Yeah, and then it's just another yeah. It's like you know it's a conflict of interest, because how do you come to an owner and say, yeah, I had to spend eight hours on this handyman job and the owner is like, well, that should have only taken four, and then you're in another. You know you're in another battle of like justifying your work and also I think staying in your lane is really important. You know, if my lane is property manager, I don't really think my lane is directly doing the maintenance itself. In other words, not doing the maintenance itself is almost another way to have checks and balances and be transparent in my business. Yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 1: 20:07

So that makes me wonder. Okay, so I am Mr John Q investor and it's my first time hiring a property manager. What are the things that I really need to look at when I am interviewing between property manager one and property manager two?

Speaker 2: 20:23

Yep, that's an awesome question. So, um, yes, so, do they do their own maintenance? And if so, you know what does that look like. You know what's your hourly rate. How do you charge? Um, you know, are you licensed and insured? You know, if you're just doing handyman work, um, again, it's that hourly rate. You know, um, if they don't do their own, uh, maintenance, then when they hire out vendors, do they upcharge for service? That's a great question.

Speaker 2: 20:53

There are so many property management companies that will upcharge for maintenance. So if they have to coordinate maintenance outside of just the day-to-day so, for instance, here you have a garbage disposal that's clogged and they have to send a vendor, they get a bill for 280, they're going to tack on 10%. We do not do that. So that is something that I don't want to get into.

Speaker 2: 21:15

I want to be very transparent with my owners. So my fee is my fee. I do not upcharge anything. I also don't upcharge for inspections. So if you need six inspections because maybe someone has a problem cleaning up, you know, cigarette butts or whatever you know which they shouldn't be smoking at all you know we need to do multiple visits to the house. Some property management companies charge per visit and for us that's just part of property management, that's part of our job. So so we try to be very transparent and again, that value system is really important for me to spearhead and keep in my business, and so I want to be very transparent with billing. I want to be very transparent with how we run things, which is awesome.

Speaker 1: 22:00

So I'm just kind of curious what should be the normal communication chain or frequency between a property management company and an investor? I one time sold a property to an investor and the property management company communicated with him and he wasn't satisfied with it and I thought it was great. So you know, everybody has a different perspective. But with your years in the business, what do you feel like is the right level of communication and how do you know when you're hitting it right?

Speaker 2: 22:33

Yeah, yeah, you know we do have owners who never want to hear from us and then we have owners who want to hear from us all the time, right. So there's there's everything in between, but we do have our own systems and processes and really you should hear from us at least four times a year with inspections, right. You should hear from us monthly with accounting and um and year-end accounting. And then you should hear from us if, no matter what big or small, you should at least get an email, if not a phone call, depending on how large the problem is. So if it's something small, we're going to send an email, ask for your approval, it gets tracked in our property meld system and basically the owner has a hand in improving work and it stays on that cloud-based system. But if it's something larger, more concerning, you're going to get a personal phone call and a hey, a heads up. You know this is what's going on.

Speaker 2: 23:29

Your hot water heater broke, it's flooded. You know we need to get a couple of quotes on a new hot water heater. Oh and, by the way, you may need an insurance claim, which is not great to hear, but the thing is property management companies. That is what we deal with and that is our job, you know. And again, we don't upcharge for anything that goes haywire. You know it's part of the business, but we definitely will not not communicate with you.

Speaker 1: 23:55

Awesome.

Speaker 2: 23:55

You know, but we're not going to also harass you either, right so it's a fine balance.

Speaker 1: 24:03

Yeah, it has to be right, because it's a small business and they're hiring you to deal with the tenants, termites and toilets, and so that doesn't mean they go away. It just means they don't deal with them face to face.

Speaker 2: 24:16

What are a couple of the?

Speaker 1: 24:17

and we're running very close to the end of our program today. But what are the couple of the biggest benefits to hiring professional property management company? Because I know a lot of people are like, ah, it's easy, I'll just do it myself. And what do you say to that?

Speaker 2: 24:32

Well, I would say that if you have a full-time job would say that if you have a full-time job, why would you enlist another part-time job by being a landlord? Really, you know, for instance, I can use myself as an as an example. I have Airbnbs. I do not want to manage them. I have my own lane and that is single family home, small apartment complexes, townhomes, condos. That is my lane to manage. I do not want to be managing Airbnbs, right, and I have no choice for these properties. They're in mountainous locations, right. They have to be Airbnbs. I don't want to do that. So I would really challenge somebody to ask them how much time do they really have to spend or even want to spend? And do you want some anonymity in terms of your own anonymous part? You can be the investor and have someone else do the dirty work.

Speaker 1: 25:25

That's a really important part, right, like I know, when I was self-managing. I had a tenant who actually killed herself. And her suicide note was left on top of the eviction papers. So from an anonymity point of view, I really had to work through. Was it my responsibility that she decided to take her life and the answer is no it wasn't, but it took a long time to get there.

Speaker 1: 25:55

And there's the good, the beautiful, the ugly and the horrific about all of this, and I really do like your anonymity point and you're adding a part-time job to it.

Speaker 2: 26:07

Yeah, definitely. And the other thing too if you're not good at keeping a hold of paperwork and keeping a hold of inspections and if you don't have time to do the damage deposition and then move out inspections, or if you don't do inspections at all, you know that is the other thing I see out of investors is sometimes they never do an inspection and they let somebody go on autopilot for nine years and then you walk through on the move out and it's atrocious because they've never done an inspection.

Speaker 2: 26:42

So you know it's just those things where there are so many benefits.

Speaker 1: 26:44

I can't tell you enough. Awesome. Well, this has been great. Yeah, thank you so much. So I'm just curious if you, if you think back to what you know now, is there a piece of advice you wish you had had a decade ago that you now know today, something that you've learned over the course of your journey?

Speaker 2: 27:09

Just that being clear in your agenda on a day-to-day basis, taking on the things that you don't want to take on, do them first, get them out of the way. That way you can lead the rest of your day, because in property management it is not glamorous, it is not sexy sometimes, and the thing is, when you take the bull by the horns the first thing in the morning, then you're cruising by the afternoon. Yeah, so yeah, just do it, you just jump in there and do it.

Speaker 1: 27:34

You should not live in Texas right away, because it sure sounds like a Texas quote to me.

Speaker 2: 27:38

I know I should pan that Definitely, so the converse of that then if that's a piece of advice you wish you had known.

Speaker 1: 27:45

I've heard it in sales term eat the frog first. Same kind of concept Totally. What's a piece of advice that was really bad that you followed.

Speaker 2: 28:01

You wish you had ignored Um not letting my own person shine through my business.

Speaker 1: 28:06

Tell me more about that.

Speaker 2: 28:07

You know trying to be someone else. So, um, I sort of entered into a gruff world doing property management and I was not very gruff, you know, but I'm very good with customer service and I'm very caring and I'm very good with communication.

Speaker 1: 28:28

Right.

Speaker 2: 28:29

And I sort of tried to follow someone else's model and I needed to make it my own. You know I needed to employ the good things that I knew and really let those shine. Yeah, and so I shouldn't have been following someone. While it's good to learn when you're a small business owner, it's also good to let your. Again, it's that value system. Let your personality shine, let your value system shine. You know and and make it your own.

Speaker 1: 29:00

Yeah, it sounds much like the idea of lead with who you are and don't change who you are to the business.

Speaker 2: 29:07

No, no.

Speaker 1: 29:09

But if you need improvement, improve, but the good things about you, you know, let that be your way, I think that's outstanding, because I hear so many young people say well, I have to be professional, and I always ask what does professional mean? And no one has an idea because it's all self-defined Correct. Yeah, all right. Is there a thought or a quote or something that moves you day in and day out that you'd like to share with our listeners?

Speaker 2: 29:38

Hmm, a thought or a quote Life is to be lived and I I tell that to myself every day. You know, you, we are not infinite beings. And every day that you're here, be happy and it's a choice. It is definitely a choice to be happy and we all get down and we all kind of face frustrations, but life is really to be lived and you kind of got one shot and just let it fly. Do your thing.

Speaker 1: 30:10

I love it. Life is to be lived. Let it fly. So tell us, lauren, if they want to learn more about your business, or they want to learn more about your business, or they want to learn more about property management and they want to contact you, what's the best way to do so?

Speaker 2: 30:23

You know you can always pick up the phone. Like I, I am not just tied behind the my cell phone generation, right, so you can always pick up the phone and call me in my company. I'm always happy to talk, Um, you know. And then if you look at my website, you can get through a hold of me through there via email. I'm open, yeah.

Speaker 1: 30:42

Well, thank you so much for joining us. You've been listening to another episode of brick your golden handcuffs and if you like what you heard, press the like button and subscribe and follow. We publish episodes every Monday and Thursday. Thanks, laura barron, for coming on again with all county uh, denver south yeah, thanks, david, I appreciate you, you too.

Speaker 2: 31:05

Bye.