Landlords have many responsibilities when caring for rental properties. Some responsibility falls on the tenants, but it is ultimately up to you to provide the basic maintenance necessities for them. What a lot of landlords neglect is that this refers to things outside the property as well as things inside it. You may have no problems scheduling regular boiler checks for your properties, but have you thought about garden maintenance?
If your rental property is occupied by one tenant, they should handle the maintenance of the outdoor space. This relates to instances where you rent out a typical family home, for example. However, if you own a block of flats or there are shared outdoor spaces between multiple tenants, the onus is on you to provide maintenance. It’s not a luxury that you add on to make it seem like you’re a good landlord – garden maintenance should be essential, and here’s why…
Attract more tenants
Do you have vacant properties that need filling? It’ll be hard to attract tenants if the garden and outdoor spaces are a complete mess. Regular garden maintenance makes your property more desirable and marketable, encouraging more people to enquire about it. If you’re been struggling to generate interest around your rental property, now’s the time to get all your outdoor power equipment parts together and tend to the garden. Once everything is neat and tidy, take new property photos and see the instant impact this has on inquiries.
Retain tenants for longer
People won’t want to live in a rental property when a shared garden is completely unkempt. It’s not just the garden that’s the issue, it’s any greenery and trees that exist on the property as well. If everything becomes overgrown and unsightly, people want to leave. It annoys them to come home to a property where the lawn is a foot high and all the bushes are overgrown. From their perspective, it makes them wonder what their rent is going towards. Sure, it goes towards the property, but they aren’t getting any extra help from the landlord, so why bother staying? Regular garden maintenance puts an end to these thoughts and encourages people to stay for longer, maximizing your income.
Prevent accidents
Lastly, garden maintenance reduces the risk of accidents and injuries happening on your property. An overgrown tree with low-hanging branches can very easily cause a personal injury. Long grass or weeks can be considered trip hazards – as can lots of wet fallen leaves in the rainy months. If you want to prevent accidents on your property, you must maintain a neat garden and the surrounding outdoor space.
At first glance, something like garden maintenance seems like a trivial thing. By all means, you should not feel responsible for keeping a garden tidy if you rent out a home with just one family or tenant living there. This is more aimed at landlords that own an apartment building or any other property with a garden shared by tenants. Don’t neglect regular maintenance as it can be highly beneficial to keep things in order.
