By Carole Hawkins, [email protected]
Shelby Heinemann became a property manager early in her real estate career. But it took her away from a company she loved.
Now she believes it was fate that led her down that path — so she could return to Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Florida Network Realty and pioneer its property management division.
“I feel like I’ve come home,” said Heinemann, who opened the new business venture for BHHS in July.
It seems like a good fit for the company, too.
Since the launch, BHHS agents have kept Heinemann busy, referring customers who opt to rent rather than buy. Heinemann has picked up 25 rental contracts and is in the process of hiring more staff.
She receives so many calls, the receptionist offered to help manage those from prospective tenants.
“It has exceeded our expectations,” Heinemann said.
In 2005 when Heinemann first came to BHHS (at the time, Prudential Network Realty), it was to become a Realtor. It’s the place where she met real estate mentor Sheron Willson, a person Heinemann still thinks of when she goes on listing appointments.
“She was a good example of how to talk to people and make sure you build a relationship,” Heinemann said.
But Heinemann found early on she was acquiring another skillset.
She worked closely with the company’s relocation division to build her business while she was training. New Jacksonville residents would sometimes rent rather than buy. Heinemann tracked down apartments for them and checked back later when they were ready to move into their own home.
Ultimately, she was drawn away by a job at another company where she could be a property manager full time.
Property management is very similar to being a real estate agent, Heinemann said. Agents still pick up listings, show property and meet with owners and buyers — or in this case, tenants. There’s one big difference, though.
“When you have a tenant, you have to ‘live’ with them for a year,” Heinemann said.
Balancing rights and responsibilities between landlords and tenants requires a secondary set of skills — rock solid grounding in Florida’s Landlord-Tenant laws.
Heinemann gained that by joining the National Association of Residential Property Managers’ Northeast Florida chapter, a group for which she is a board member.
It’s a place to learn about such things as security deposit claims, the legal process for an eviction and the fact that it’s illegal to turn off the electricity when a tenant doesn’t pay rent.
When Heinemann first participated in the property managers’ association, her company had been printing leases from a website and filling in the tenant’s information.
“We came back from the session with a list this long of things we needed to change,” Heinemann said, stretching out her arms.
Heinemann said the association has grown its membership from 50 to 100 over the time she’s participated. It’s because of excellent programming and not because of housing downturn, she says.
But, many Realtors did turn to property management during recession.
“A lot of people were just trying to make ends meet,” Heinemann said.
The beginning of the recession was a boom time for the property management business. But, not for long.
“After a while people literally went into hibernation,” Heinemann said. “They just stayed wherever they were living, nobody was going anywhere.”
Property managers still collected monthly commissions on their rentals, but placement fees were scarce from renters who were changing homes.
Today, just like the rest of real estate, things are better.
Some of the business comes from owners who choose to rent rather than sell when a home is underwater. Because of the recovery, it’s more likely now to be a short-term situation.
“Homes are not $100,000 underwater anymore,” Heinemann said. “It’s $10,000 or $20,000. There’s not such a big gap.”