Owning a rental property may offer a host of benefits to anyone looking for a reliable source of income, but it’s not necessarily the hands-off, passive experience you’re looking for. By hiring a property management firm to manage tenants and the myriad problems which arise when you lease, you take the normal benefits of leasing property and add these eight bonuses to the list:

1. Travel more

When you manage your own properties, you essentially lock yourself to the immediate vicinity of your residents. Even with a savvy, independently capable maintenance team and other employees to handle issues, you’re still taking major risks any time you travel far from your holdings. When you hire a property management company, these problems evaporate; you can go where you like, confident that any issues which arise will be handled professionally and thoroughly. You don’t have to worry that your vacation out of state will end up costing you exponentially more than it should due to unattended properties.

2. Enjoy your weekends

When you handle your own property, you’ll be on call 24/7 whether you want to be or not. If a water main ruptures on your rental property or the electricity goes out, it’s your phone ringing at 3 a.m. on a Saturday. With a rental management company at work, your weekends belong to you again. If you want to check in on your property, you can do so on your own schedule—not in response to every emergency minor or major.

3. Get out of asking for money

There’s nothing wrong with asking for rent from your tenants, but not everyone feels comfortable doing so – especially when rent is late. If the thought of making that call to ask about rent leaves you squeamish, a property management company might allow you far greater peace of mind. When you add in the complexities of the laws governing security deposits, rent collection, damages, and other expenses to the picture, the argument in favor of professional assistance only grows stronger.

4. Have professionals to advise you

Real estate isn’t always the simplest field to navigate, even if you’re a savvy individual willing to do your homework. Having professionals on hand to advise you on the best way to handle issues without violating laws may be the single greatest case to be made for property management services. Even if you’re comfortable with all the rest, avoiding major missteps is crucial.

5. Make hands-off income

Whether you’re looking to retire or want the freedom to pursue other revenue streams with your time, the hands-off advantage of third party property management can’t be underestimated. The better the company at work on your property, the less attention you’ll need to dedicate to the process. Find the right team to handle things, and your job reduces to collecting checks and enjoying your free time.

6. Find ways to increase your income

Management companies know all the tricks and updates necessary to make a property more valuable, and thus more enticing to tenants. For example, PropertyADVANTAGE’s Del Mar Property Management team was able to help a condo owner in Del Mar increase the rent of his property by 47 percent. See how we did it here.

If you’re struggling to fill your properties with qualified tenants, or you’re looking for the best way to make your properties more rentable, working with a savvy property management company may be your best move.

7. Sign qualified tenants

Very few areas of property management invite disaster and headache quite so easily as the process of finding qualified tenants. There’s a thin line to be walked for maximum profitability; you can’t allow anyone and everyone with an interest in leasing into your properties, lest you end up with chronic late payments, an unsavory reputation, property damage, and other problems. But you absolutely cannot afford to find yourself discriminating against protected classes, even by accident. Working with an experienced property management company allows you to leverage their extensive experience and toolset for this process, giving you far better tenants with far less legal exposure.

8. Get rapid problem-solving

There’s only so much a single individual can keep track of, only so fast you can learn. When a tenant comes up with a complaint, when a property runs afoul of a new regulation, the speed with which you handle those issues can be quite important. Researching the myriad intertwining issues around any particular problem can become a major time sink—throw a few out at once, and it becomes impossible to keep up with them appropriately. By hiring a property management company, you gain the expertise of an entire team, skilled and equipped to handle every problem rapidly as it arises.

Not everyone necessarily needs a property management company’s assistance, but most property owners would benefit from the professional help and the simple freedom afforded by that help. Just make sure you’re hiring the right company for the task. Ask the right questions, investigate other clients, and check in from time to time.