Last week, I started a new topic about losing a manager, one of a mobile home park investor’s worst fears, especially those that invest long distance.

 

It was a timely subject, since the manager at one of our mobile home parks informed us 3:45 PM on Sunday  she would not be reporting for work on Monday. There was no notice.

 

This was the second time in two years that we let a manager stay on and almost ruin a multi-million dollar property of ours, out of our loyalty and affection for the person. The warning signs were the same for both: alcohol and drug abuse, slovenly personal habits, complaints from tenants and customers that their requests and phone calls were not answered, and lies and cover-ups on tasks we asked to be performed.

 

The benefit of losing an employee is that you know even better what you want from the next one, based upon your experience with the prior one.

As you know, we were left with 2 mobile home parks and a large commercial property with no on-site manager. We wrote down a list of priorities, the important tasks that had to be accomplished right away.

Our list of priorities were:

1-   Make sure the collected rents were safe and waiting for us

2-   Change locks at locations that needed to be secure

3-   Playback messages, call forward phone calls to our main office

4-   Notify tenants the previous manager no longer worked for us

5-   Handle new leases

6-   Schedule necessary repairs and maintenance

7-   Get the manager’s office, its computer and files, up and running

8-   Place an ad in CraigsList for a new manager, and begin our own search inside the company for one

9-   Contact delinquent tenants to see if there was theft or fraud

While this list looks formidable, we completed it within two days after the previous manager left. During this time, all of our properties were  performing as well as before, and all of our tenants felt secure.

 

I owe a debt of gratitude to my wife, Fran, for taking charge during the transfer of managers, and maintaining stability during this challenging time, while I was out of the country. She worked long hours to correct any problems that arose, and she used ingenuity to improve the park. 

 

I am pleased to report now, a month after our manager quit, all of our properties are performing better than before, with a manager that is superior to the one we had. I will discuss this later on, in the last task. We have already discussed the first three priority tasks last week. Now we will now discuss the remaining six.

 

Notify tenants the previous manager no longer worked for us

We made up a notice that stated: our previous manager no longer worked with us, and that all rents should continue to be mailed to our office, or dropped off at either of the parks’ mail slots. We did not go into the details of what happened, keeping the “drama” to a minimum. We were surprised by the information our tenants offered as to our prior manager’s behavior, now that it was “safe” for them to report it.

 

Handle new leases

We had three scheduled appointments that our manager made to write leases and collect money from new tenants. We met the tenants at the park office, or our main office, and completed the task. We have a system where our main office handles all the phone calls from prospective tenants, and after we  qualify them, we make appointments with our managers to view the properties, and then write leases and collect money.

 

Schedule necessary repairs and maintenance

Once again, we run this part of our business out of our central office. We have more than 10 handymen, and we move them around to different properties as the need arises. Also, information on maintenance and  repairs was supplied by our on-site handyman as well.

 

Get the manager’s office, its computer and files, up and running

Again, we have all our computer files and papers at our main office. The manager’s computer was used mainly for communication with us by email, to check tenants on the Internet, and to scan in papers and bills that needed to be sent to the office.

 

For those of you that give access to your computer system to the manager, you could have a huge challenge if your former manager gets angry and decides to erase all your computer files, and you have no backup. Therefore, you should make backups each night of your rental database to protect yourself. We limit access to our computer management system, RentManager, to our central office, where only members of our family can use it.

 

Place an ad in CraigsList for a new manager, and begin our own search inside the company for one

We placed a help wanted ad in Craigslist the minute the manager informed us she was quitting. The first four hours, we received 10 resumes. To date we have received over 160 resumes.

 

We were precise in our ad, insisting on people with prior  experience managing at least a 50 unit mobile home park or apartment building. I would estimate that 1 out of 4 had this experience, with the other 3 out of 4 stretching their experience out of the dire necessity for a job. We still had more than 40 people that were qualified to replace the manager.

 

However, we didn’t need to go outside the company. My handyman at the park, a lovable old guy who has been with me 16 years, suggested using Tommy, the husband of our motel manager. It jarred my consciousness. I thought of Tommy as the backup to the manager of the motel, and the handyman when repairs where needed.

 

It turned out to be a great idea. Tommy learned how to deal with people from the motel, and he had a reservoir of repair skills to get the park back into tip top shape. Already he has trimmed and cleaned the front of the park, painted the RV bathhouse, and decorated the clubhouse with the help of his 9 year old daughter. He has also sold 2 mobile homes we owned in the park, and rented out an apartment. He has something that I prize – a strong desire to do a good job, and he wants the job very badly.

 

It bears repeating – the benefit of losing an employee is that you know even better what you want from the next one, based upon your experience with the prior one. The previous manager woke up late every day with a lousy attitude, worked 5 days, 8:30 – 5, doing the minimum.

 

Tommy works 6 days a week, Monday through Saturday, from 9 until 6, because many of our prospects need to come by after work, between 5 and 6, or on Saturday, when they are off.

 

Again, how would you handle this if you could not get to the park as quickly as we did? What if you were away on business, out of the country, or you just couldn’t free yourself from what you were presently doing?

You still have the same options:

1-   Contact the park handyman and have him do as many of the last six tasks as he is capable of

2-   Contact a competent local property manager and ask him or her to work with your park handyman to stabilize the situation

3-   If there is a tenant at the park that

you trust, have him or her act in accordance with your park handyman, with the possibility of that person stepping in might be the new manager

 

I hope you took with you, throughout this two part series, the fact that even though losing a manager on a mobile home park you manage long distance is a challenge, it is NOT an overwhelming challenge. Life goes on, and it’s all for the best. 

 

We turned this challenge into an improvement for our properties.

 

Cheers, mate!

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