by Sean Hess (Sean@StAugTeam.com), Broker and Manager for St. Augustine Team Realty (www.StAugustineTeamRealty.com). Join us on Facebook.
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So I’m doing yard work last weekend and a car rolls up and the people wave me over. They want to know if there are any rentals in the neighborhood.
I let them know I’m a Realtor and no, there aren’t any rentals in the neighborhood. I help them best I can and tell them where they can look.
But I walk away thinking, “Are these people nuts? Who drives around looking for rentals anymore…what a waste!”
This was not to be disrespectful to these folks (they were very nice). But seriously, you can sit down at your computer and find the rentals yourself (or homes for sale if you’re looking to for something to buy). You save gas and time, and you don’t miss the rentals without signs (most condos don’t allow signs).
There’s a short video below on how to do it, but here it is in a nutshell.
The first place you want to look is www.Realtor.com. Why? Because this is where a lot of the residential property managers place their listings. It feeds from Realtor MLS systems and is accurate to the day. In other words, if a property manager adds a rental listing (or a sales agent adds a home for sale) to an MLS anywhere, or a change is made, it will show up on Realtor.com that day. So it is the most up to date and comprehensive system for finding rentals or homes for sale.
The second place you want to look is an online classified site like Craigslist.com (or Backpage.com or Ebay Classifieds). Why? Because this is where a lot of the private sellers and landlords will place their property. You can see what date the listings are posted so it will give you what idea how fresh they are. The one caveat is that there are a lot of scammers in the online classifieds. A scammer might find a vacant house (like a foreclosure), change the locks, advertise it for rent, take your money and then disappear. So do your due dilligence.
The last way is by going old school to the newspaper classifieds, in our case that would be the St. Augustine Record or their online classified system at www.StAugustine.com. Newspaper classifieds cost money, so in the age of Craigslist most real estate agents and private parties don’t use them like they used to. But the benefit to placing a classified (for a seller or landlord) is they might be the only one doing it, and thus it will bring more eyeballs to their ad. Your eyeballs.
Hope you enjoy the video!
If you need a group of Realtors that can track down any rental or home for sale fast, contact St. Augustine Team Realty!
