So, you’ve been renting out your first property and it’s (hopefully) going well. Great! What’s the next step? If you want to keep up with the competition, you might want to look into how you can make the proper adjustments in order to create a better rental situation.

Streamline Rent Collection

This one is especially important if you are a landlord for more than one unit and need to collect rent from multiple individuals. There are many ways you could go about that process, but one of the best is to integrate technology. So much is done nowadays over the internet, the vast majority of potential renters shouldn’t have any problem with using the internet. For most, it’s actually the most convenient setup. What you’d have to do is make a secure website with an account system. Rent then can be paid within the tenants’ accounts – painlessly and cash-free. This will take some time and money, of course, but it’s definitely worth the trouble if you’re going to be upgrading your renting to the next level.

Add Asset Protection

With multiple units or multiple properties being owned by you (or at least, if that is your goal for the near future), you’re practically a business. You can actually legally create a corporation, a general partnership, an LLC, or another legal business entity. Out of all of these, LLCs are best for asset protection, which can be valuable for a landlord. Also, an LLC requires little ongoing maintenance such as paperwork. Basically, by creating an LLC, you will be setting a clear boundary between assets for the business and personal assets. This means that, no matter what legislation you run into, you won’t have to mix the two and get caught up in all of the associated problems.

Look Toward Expansion

Expansion is going to be different for everybody. Obviously, more units and/or more properties owned will be a very good thing that you could look towards purchasing. But you also can expand in other ways. You can delegate, and hire more managers, secretaries, employees, cleaners, and repairmen to help lighten the workload. You can look for smaller landlords who are trying to sell their properties and instead combine their assets into yours.

There are lots of directions you could take your business and investment. Just make sure that you do your research beforehand! If you know the market, and you move in the right direction at a good pace, you’ll see your profits improve exponentially.

Check out this article on what every new investor needs to know about asset protection!