Interviewed six managers before owning anything, which changed my target market

I'm still on the list-building side, no purchase yet. I decided to interview managers in the two submarkets I was choosing between, before I bought, because I kept reading that management is what makes or breaks a small rental and I didn't want to find out after closing.

What I did: called six shops, three in each submarket. Asked each of them for a blank copy of their management agreement, a sample monthly owner statement, and their average days to lease over the past year. Told them plainly I was 6 to 12 months from buying.

Four sent everything. One sent the agreement only. One wouldn't send anything until I owned a property, which told me plenty.

What I learned that actually moved my decision. In submarket one, all three quoted 10% with a half month leasing fee, and days to lease came back 21, 26 and 33. In submarket two, quotes were 9% but leasing was a full month, and days to lease came back 44, 51 and "depends." Same rent levels roughly. On a $1,300 unit, 25 extra vacant days is about $1,070 a year in lost rent, which swamps the 1 point of fee I'd have saved.

The part that nearly derailed it was the sample owner statements. Two of them were unreadable, one page of net numbers with no invoice detail, and I almost didn't ask for the itemized version because I felt like a tire kicker with nothing to buy. Asking anyway was the whole value of the exercise.

What I'd keep: asking for the blank agreement first. It's the least emotional document in the process and it tells you how the shop thinks.