Grimm Realty Group
- Sep 7, 2022
- 3 min read

Property Maintenance Crews: A Landlord's Guide to Hiring

Updated: Oct 23, 2022

As your portfolio of Investment Properties grows, so will the need to hire the staff to manage the properties. Repairs, preventative maintenance, & general upkeep are part of the responsibilities you’ll want to address when hiring staff to manage your rentals. Here is a guide to help you start finding the right Property Maintenance Crews to Hire!

Property Maintenance Crews: A Landlord's Guide to Hiring - Architecture for Remodeling

Property Maintenance Responsibilities

When hiring Property Maintenance personnel, you’ll want to keep in mind the responsibilities that they will be in charge of on an hourly, weekly, monthly, & yearly basis. This may even require an on-call schedule for nights & weekends.

Restore Functionality and Prevent Breakdowns
Retain (and increase) Property Value
Ensure Occupant Comfort & Safety

While some tasks are scheduled in advance, others may require last-minute arrangements. Items like monthly landscaping upkeep, cutting the grass weekly, or trash removal are pretty standard practices to schedule. Incidents like busted pipes or broken water heaters are maintenance tasks that come up sporadically but you'll want to have a dedicated staff member & a strategy to handle them when they do arise.

What are Typical Maintenance Issues?

Emergency Repairs: Fire (after calling 911), CO detection (after calling 911), Gas Leaks, Broken water pipes or other flooding, no heat or HVAC malfunctions, plugged toilet or total plumbing stoppage, or any other issue that affects the safety of the tenant or property
Non-Emergency Repairs: lockouts, garbage disposals, clogged drains, electric fuses, broken blinds, or no hot water
Upkeep and Maintenance: painting & minor repairs to walls, repair or replace typical items like outlet covers/ weather-stripping/ smoke detectors, repair or replace sinks & faucets, changing furnace filters, snow removal, changing locks at unit turnover, & coordinating with outside contractors

Finding the right Property Maintenance Team

When it comes to having the right Property Maintenance Team to manage your rentals, it ultimately depends on what responsibilities you need them to handle. In reality, this depends heavily on the size of your Investment Property Portfolio, how much you want to handle as an owner, & if it’s more beneficial to delegate more responsibilities. If you own more than 1 rental unit, you’ll probably want to consider at least having a Property Manager to assist with answering calls, admin such as invoicing, & calling contractors when situations arise. The next step would be to find Maintenance Technicians who handle simple repairs and if you own enough property, maybe a Maintenance Supervisor. Other staff to consider hiring include Janitorial staff, partnering with contractors & vendors, and an accountant/bookkeeper if your portfolio is large enough.

While finding reliable & quality staff is never easy, you can start by asking around your network of friends/family/colleagues for references to people they may know. If word-of-mouth options don't pan out, you could also search on social media or post a position on job boards like Indeed or Monster.com. Keep in mind that the best employees are more likely to already have a job or at least come at a higher cost so patience will be important. For the everyday upkeep items, you can consider hiring high school or college students part-time & train them on the items you need them to handle. When it comes to more technical repairs, it may be best to outsource to contractors for high-quality work at a cost-effective price.

Contact Us for Investment Property Guidance

When looking at Rental Properties as a potential investment, keep in mind that there is more to the process than buying, renting, & selling the units. As your portfolio of rental units increases, so will the need for hiring staff to assist in managing the properties. If you need guidance on recommended contractors or insights on how to hire great staff, you can schedule a call with Doug Grimm of Grimm Realty Group.

Schedule a Zoom Meeting with Grimm Realty Group to discuss your Investment Property needs!