Introduction:

What will make you most successful as a landlord? What satisfies you most? What gets you up in the morning? Keeps you awake at night? The Landlord Opportunities Map will help you discover:

• what matters most
• how to maximize success
• how to have more fun!

 

Exploring a Variety of Approaches to Landlording

Consider two different types of landlords. One plays it straight – maximizing rent, securing healthy rent increases, pursuing immediate eviction when needed – while spending her free time and resources on things that matter. She prioritizes her parenting, contributes to causes she cares about and volunteers, all possible due to her success as a landlord.

Another type of landlord occasionally drives his tenant to medical appointments. He will make payment plans or barter tenant labor for rent while attending to court procedures as well. This landlord will limit his rent increases or avoid them altogether. He'll also advocate for tenants to help them get benefits and services, and counsel them as well. All of this he does in a conscious way while also making sure to meet his income goals.

Whether your style matches one of these approaches or another, landlords will succeed best based on how well they attend to five key areas of landlord life presented below.

While many landlords I have worked with have succeeded by emphasizing one area over another, the vital indicator of success is whether they have adequately attended to each of the five areas of landlord life below.

Two core assumptions

1. Landlords whose properties are significantly unstable will need a larger intervention than is offered here.
2. When landlords adequately attend to all five areas, they will establish conditions for success.

What is Your Approach?

So, let’s look at your approach now and how you may want to change it in the future. Which mix best represents your approach? Are you comfortable with this approach? If not, what changes would you like to make to improve your landlording? This assessment will help you answer these and other questions so can you determine what changes you want to make to your landlording.

The Landlord Opportunities Map will help you explore two areas:

Part I Current Landlord Opportunities Map

Where are you now as a Landlord?

Part II Future Landlord Opportunities Map

What changes will increase your success?

 

Questions to help you prepare

Before you start, take a few moments to answer a few introductory questions. These questions will help you consider what works well now, and where you want to be in the future.

Now, on to the Map ...

PART 1:

CURRENT MAP #1: WHERE YOU ARE RIGHT NOW AS A LANDLORD

Instructions:

Fill out the survey based on where you are now as a landlord.

Step 1. Review the five areas one by one.

Step 2.

• For each area, read the three statements and
• rate yourself from 1 - 5 for each, based on how much importance you place on each aspect.

‘1’ is LEAST IMPORTANT and ‘5’ is MOST IMPORTANT.

Definition: ”Important” is defined as how much you currently ‘care for’, ‘attend to’ and ‘invest in’ that area.

Part I.  Current Landlord Opportunities Map

SCORING YOUR MAP

1. The specifics: Looking at each of the five areas (15 maximum)

Instructions: From your assessment write down your score for each of the five areas.

Interpreting Your Score

 

2. The big picture: Your score for all five areas combined (75 maximum)

Instructions: Locate the bottom line titled My Score for All is ____

Score yourself as follows:

3. How balanced? Examining how scores in each area compare to each other and whether more balance is needed. 

Instructions:

How balanced?  If an area is:

Average: You're doing ok in this area but consider making improvements.

Below Average: You should make improvements.

Above average: No improvements are needed.

Learning from Part I

Write a few sentences below about what you learned from this assessment. What is going well for you as a landlord? What isn’t? What could be changed? The purpose here is to generate ideas about future improvements. 

Preparing for Part II

“Cheshire Puss,” Alice began, “would you please tell me which way I ought to go from here?”“That depends on where you want to get to.” said the cat. - Lewis Caroll in Alice in Wonderland

What kind of landlord do you want to be? This question may seem naïve, but not if you ask yourself: Are you — right now — the landlord you want to be, the landlord you imagined you'd be, leading the life you  wanted?

Steven Covey, in his Seven (7) habits of Highly Effective People asks us to ‘Begin with the End in Mind’ – to imagine what you cannot at present see with your eyes. It is based on the principle that all things are created twice. Firstly, there is the mental creation. Then there’s the second, physical creation. The physical creation follows the mental just as a building follows a blueprint. If you don't make an effort to imagine the kind of landlord you are and where you want to go, then you risk allowing your tenants, neighbors, family members and the market to shape your landlording by default.

Begin with the End in Mind means to begin each new tenancy or turnover, each new rehab project or new investment with a clear vision of your desired direction and goals. Then you can take a proactive stance to make things happen as you have already imagined it.

Now, on to Part II

PART II:

YOUR FUTURE MAP:  WHAT CHANGES AND IMPROVEMENTS DO YOU WANT TO MAKE AHEAD AS A LANDLORD?

This landlord opportunities map will help chart where you want to go as a landlord. It is your blueprint for success and can help you clarify what changes are needed to make your business thrive. Your landlord opportunities map can make a big difference in moving you forward.

 

Instructions:

Fill out the survey below from the perspective of where you want your landlord business to go in the FUTURE, say within 5 years.

Step 1. Review the five main areas again this time thinking of the future.

Step 2. Now go through each of the five areas, one by one:

• For each area, read the three statements presented and
• Rate yourself on each of the the statements based on how much you want to make a change in this particular aspect of being a landlord.

Key: Rate yourself for each statement from a score of 1 – 5 in terms of how much you want to make a change or improvement where:

1 =  No desire to make a change or improvement

2 =  Little desire to make a change or improvement

3 =  Reasonable desire to make a change or improvement

4 =  Healthy desire to make a change or improvement

5 =  Highly motivated and energized to make a change or improvement

 

Note: Part 1 measured importance in the present, Part II measures desire or need in the future.

Part II.  Future Landlord Opportunities Map

SCORING YOUR MAP

1. The specifics: Looking at each of the five areas (15 maximum)

Instructions: From your assessment write down your score for each of the five areas.

Interpreting Your Score

 

2. The big picture: Your score for all five areas combined (75 maximum)

Instructions: From your assessment locate the bottom line titled My Score All is ____

Score yourself as follows:

Learning from Part II

Take a moment to reflect on your answers and scores and discover what more you can learn from your map. Write a few sentences about what pops out at you from this map. What changes and improvements do you need to make, if any.  What is working well, or not so well?  The purpose here is not to develop a finished piece, but rather to get your juices flowing and to get you excited about becoming the landlord that you want to become.

Ways to continue using this map

Plan to periodically check in with yourself to reflect and evaluate your life and practice as a landlord. The work you have done here can serve as just a beginning for clarifying your landlord opportunities. As our priorities change over time, taking stock can help energize you and clarify next steps. Try answering the following questions every 6 months in order to inspire making ongoing changes and improvements.  You can also do the assessment on a yearly basis to help you consider what changes you may want to make in the future.

Good luck on your adventure and keep checking in with yourself to make sure you are on the path you want to be on.