Are property managers the answer?

Paul Mukholi who owns 20 rental units in the upscale Naalya estate, has not parted ways with a tenant amicably, the case always ends up at the police station or local council court because Mukholi, like most landlords tries to understand his tenants and gives them extensions when they are hard up and explain themselves. Because of this and the fact that he has other commitments that keep him away from his property, tenants at times go as many as five months without paying rent, breaking the tenants agreements he signs with them, which only give a month’s extension.

Landlord woes
Paul says that recently when he tried to enforce a tenants agreement by locking up a tenant house, the tenant took him to police and claimed he had lost Shs3m that he had left in the house, money Paul says, amounted to the rent he was demanding him. “I asked myself and also asked the policemen at the station who were siding with him why, if the man had Shs3m in his house, was not paying me?” In the end, the police asked the tenant to leave the house and also made him sign a commitment to pay the accrued rent at the start of the new month, as police investigations into the alleged lost of the money continued, however after taking his things out of the house, the tenant disappeared and hasn’t showed up three months later.

This story is not unique to Mukholi and most people who own rental units or apartments have had such experiences with tenants. Property owners get so frustrated by such experiences and according to Moses Kato a landlord, law enforcement agencies in total disregard of the law they are supposed to be enforcing and facts on the ground, tend to favour tenants, something he thinks is a mirror of our own society where people look at those with property or those they perceive to be rich in a bad way and seem to blame their problems on them
“ You go to a police station and somebody treats you like a rival” he says. Some people like Robert Senyange, a lawyer and a tenant, however blames the law which he says leaves the power to issue tenants agreements in the hands of the landlord and it’s always a take it or leave it for the tenant who he says is at times too desperate to say no to a bad agreement.

Entry of the property management company
The relationship between tenants and their landlords has led to a rise in the number of property management companies that have sprung up around the country taking away the human face of rent collection and competing with the likes of Knight Frank and Bageine and Company, who are the big boys in the business, their companies, collect rent on behalf of the building owners, maintain the property, provide security and also market the building on behalf of the owners, taking a percentage off the rent collected as payment. And Suzan Katamba, who owns an apartment block in Entebbe and uses Soka Property Agency Limited as her property manager says the arrangement she has with the company makes it possible for her to concentrate on her other work

“ I charge Shs550,000 a month for each of my apartments and the company takes 20 per cent as payment for the services they provide which includes collection, security, cleaning and maintenance plus marketing and at the end of the month I find all the money on my account I don’t even need to go to the building” Katamba says. She adds that even if the tenants have not paid rent, she still gets her money on the 15th of every month.

Treading cautiously
However, Peter Sembatya who also owns rental units disagrees with this kind of arrangement saying it encourages complacency where a land lord spends years without even looking at his property because he gets his money all the time. “What if they sell the building?” He asks, adding that some of these companies are run by fraudsters and by the time you realise it people have already owned and sold your property on your behalf.

Sembatya also says he can save more collecting the money himself than when he contracts a company to do it on his behalf, companies that he says will even make you beg for your money which he says is frustrating for somebody who invested their hard-earned money.
Dan Kasendwa of Wilken Property Services however, advise, people to sign management contracts with companies whose background and reputation is clear “ Those who manage property are many, but genuine property managers are few, don’t just sign an agreement with anybody who calls themselves a property manager” he says.

editorial@ug.nationmedia.com