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COVID-19: Managing rent arrears

March 21, 2020 by Michelle Faye Antonio

COVID-19: Managing rent arrears

What if the tenant can’t pay their rent arrears?

Rent arrears – they are a serious issue. In the past couple of days, we are seeing many businesses starting to let go of staff. It’s a terrible time if you’re in tourism or hospitality. This will result in a number of your tenants being out of a job and perhaps unable to pay rent.

What action to take?

BE COMPASSIONATE

Regardless of the rent arrears, this is a terrible time for everyone. Be understanding and helpful. In the end, supporting one another is the most important thing we do at this time.

ASSESS THE SITUATION

We recommend that you go through your tenant list in your property management software and tag them by the risk of rent arrears: HIGH, MED, LOW. This is not to stigmatise your tenants but so you can help those in greatest need. The categories might look like this:

High – works in tourism, hospitality, importing or exporting business, in an airline or airport-related job
Medium – works in all other sectors
Low – works in the health, food, courier, beneficiary

Read our blog about risk assessment.

COMMUNICATE

In this situation, the best thing we can do is keep regular contact with our tenants and landlords. Increase your frequency of communication to at least weekly but in some cases almost daily. Based on the risk assessment of the tenant I would adjust my communication style. For example, for the high-risk situations, I recommend ringing, texting, and emailing both tenants and landlords. The landlord needs to be aware of the situation and the measures you are putting in place. The tenant needs your support. For the low to the medium risk, they might only require emails. 

BE CARING AND SUPPORTIVE

If the tenant has lost their job, they will be very distraught. Love and understanding is the greatest thing we can show right now.

BE FLEXIBLE

If the tenant has rent arrears then come up with something that can help them. Be flexible. A rent reduction or a rent holiday could be two options. It may mean that the rent has to drop for 6 months or more. 

KIA KAHA – BE STRONG

There may be situations where the tenant has to be evicted. If you feel that the tenant is taking advantage of your good nature. Whether it’s a 14-day notice or an application to the tenancy tribunal, then be strong (but kind) and take the actions you need.

BE CREATIVE

This situation is unprecedented and as such, there is no playbook. We need to be creating and ‘making up’ solutions on the fly. At the time of writing this blog, Countdown is employing people nationwide. They are supporting this country and community by creating jobs for people. Think about how you and your business can be creative to help your owners and tenants at this.

BE POSITIVE

For every cloud, there is a silver lining. At the moment there are 80,000 ex-pats returning to New Zealand. They will all need homes. This information could lift the spirits of your owners and allow them to understand that this ‘blip’ is only temporary.

RING YOUR MUM AND DAD

Property management is all-consuming. It’s easy to work from sun-up to sun-down and beyond. It’s 6 am on a Saturday while I write this. In these tumultuous times don’t forget to call and tell those closest to you how you feel about them. 

Originally published 2020/04/06 at 4:57 pm, updated 17/03/2021

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How can we help?

If there is anything we can do to help you or your business please let us know.

Rueben Skipper

rueben@hamishturner.co.nz
021 1814147

Hamish Turner
hamish@hamishturner.co.nz
027 5699991

rueben skipper

About the author

Rueben is an entrepreneur with 20 years of business experience in a number of sectors. In the past decade, Rueben has worked a handful of technology startups (e.g. Timely) in the area of digital sales and marketing. In addition, he has run a social media marketing agency since 2013. He currently owns a property management company based in Dunedin.

You can check out more about his background and follow his VLOG on his Linkedin profile.

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Filed Under: COVID-19, News Tagged With: COVID-19

COVID-19: How to undertake a safe property inspection

March 21, 2020 by Michelle Faye Antonio

Creating a COVID-19 Safe Property Inspection Process

covid-19 safe property inspection

Why shouldn’t we just stop doing inspections?

It has been suggested by some other commentators in the sector that rental property inspections should be suspected for 90 days. Although we applaud the efforts to keep staff safe, the question we ask is, what happens after 90 days is up?

Nowhere has the Ministry of Health ever set a time frame of 90 days. The only timeframe we can be certain about is that nothing can go back to how it was until we have a vaccine for Coronavirus. Best estimates are saying this will be 18-24 months away.

Currently in New Zealand, in order for certain insurance claims to be eligible, we must inspect the rental property every three months. The current inspections process, however, may not be safe for property managers.

Creating a COVID-19 safe inspection process

There are possibly many solutions to this challenge including technology for inspecting the home or tenant self-inspection systems. The most practical approach, that would be easy to implement, would be adding a pre-inspection risk analysis to every inspection and then improving the safety of the inspection itself.

For example, this might mean conducting a pre-inspection phone survey with the tenant to assess the current risk within the rental property. If the risk is low then the inspection will go ahead as scheduled. If not, then it will be rescheduled for 14 days from now.

For the inspection itself, the tenants would be required to be out of the house at the time of inspection, the property manager would wear appropriate protective clothing (e.g. gloves & mask), and would take extra precautions such as avoiding touching surfaces. Upon completing the inspection the property manager would discard their protective clothing and clean their hands with hand sanitiser.

 

How can we help?

If there is anything we can do to help you or your business please let us know.

 

Hamish Turner
hamish@hamishturner.co.nz
027 5699991

Kick off 2020 with a
Financial Health Check of your rent roll

Click here
rueben skipper

About the author

Rueben is a consultant at Hamish Turner & Associates. He is an entrepreneur with 20 years of business experience in a number of sectors. In the past decade, Rueben has worked in a handful of technology startups (e.g. Timely) in the area of digital sales and marketing. In addition, he has run a social media marketing agency since 2013 providing social media services and digital marketing services to small businesses across NZ.

You can check out more about his background and follow his VLOG on his Linkedin profile.

Share this article

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COVID-19: Working from home when you’re a property manager

COVID-19: Managing rent arrears

COVID-19: Business Support Package

COVID-19: Creating a contingency plan

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Filed Under: COVID-19, News Tagged With: COVID-19

COVID-19: Business Support Package

March 18, 2020 by Michelle Faye Antonio

Covid 19:
Business Support Package

Update – 23/03/2020

This package was increased to include all businesses and to remove the $150,000 salary cap for any individual business.

What is it?

In the past few months, the world’s economy has been severely hurt by the outbreak of COVID-19. In many countries, businesses have been shut down by governments seeking to prevent the spread of this deadly disease. Sectors that have been particularly affected are tourism and hospitality but everyone feels the flow-on effects of forced isolation and reduced consumer confidence.

In an effort, to prop up the New Zealand economy the government has released the NZ Business Support Package. This is a $12.1bn relief package for New Zealanders.  It is one of the largest packages in the world per capita.

The $12.1 billion package includes:

  • Initial $500 million boosts for health
  • $5.1 billion in wage subsidies for affected businesses in all sectors and regions, available from today
  • $126 million in COVID-19 leave and self-isolation support
  • $2.8 billion income support package for our most vulnerable, including a permanent $25 per week benefit increase and a doubling of the Winter Energy Payment for 2020
  • $100 million redeployment package
  • $2.8 billion in business tax changes to free up cash flow, including a provisional tax threshold lift, the reinstatement of building depreciation and writing off interest on the late payment of tax
  • $600 million initial aviation support package

You can read more detail on the government website: https://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/121-billion-support-new-zealanders-and-business

Who qualifies for this package?

If you’re an employer, contractor, sole trader, or self-employed, you may qualify for the COVID-19 wage subsidy.

  • your business must be registered and operating in New Zealand
  • your employees must be legally working in New Zealand
    the business must have experienced a minimum 30% decline in actual or predicted revenue over the period of a month when compared with the same month last year, and that decline is related to COVID-19
  • your business must have taken active steps to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 (See how you can work towards this one below)
  • you must make best efforts to retain employees and pay them a minimum of 80% of their normal income for the subsidised period.

For definitions of these qualifications, see the information under the Definitions for Wage Subsidy qualifications.

How much can you get?

The COVID-19 wage subsidy pays a flat rate of:

  • $585.80 for people working 20 hours or more per week
  • $350.00 for people working less than 20 hours per week

The subsidy is paid as a lump sum and covers 12 weeks per employee. It can be used for wages only. The aim is to help employers key their staff and ensure future viability of the business.

How do you apply?

You apply online for the wage subsidy or leave payment. You will need

  • the IRD numbers of your business and the employees
  • the business name and address and contact details
  • the employee names and contact details

The Ministry of Social Development will be processing applications as quickly as possible. They are aiming to make payments 5 working days after the application is approved.

How can we help?

If there is anything we can do to help you or your business please let us know.

 

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Filed Under: COVID-19, News Tagged With: COVID-19

COVID-19: Creating a contingency plan

March 12, 2020 by Michelle Faye Antonio

Creating a contingenncy plan

What you need to know about Covid-19

What you need to know about COVID-19 (Coronavirus) as of 12 March 2020

The symptoms for COVID-19 include coughing, shortness of breath, and/or fever, but could also just be tiredness, feeling achy, sore throat. It looks like many people with COVID-19 experience a relatively mild infection, ranging from cold and flu-like symptoms to feeling like the actual flu. Mild to moderate infections are taking about two weeks to recover from. About 20% of people have been experiencing a much more serious infection requiring hospitalisation for several weeks. From the data so far the case fatality rate rises as you get older, and is higher in those with underlying health conditions.

On the 11th of March, COVID-19 was upgraded to a Pandemic by the World Health Organisation. At that time there were over 100,000 cases world-wide and over 4000 deaths.  Schools have closed down in the worst hit countries. New Zealand has five confirmed cases but the worst-case scenario forecast by the ministry of health for NZ is that 40% of the population catch it over an 8 week period. This could mean 30% of staff being unwell and unable to work. It could mean hundreds of elderly at risk with health services unable to meet the demand.

Responsibilities

Workplace risks

Any infectious disease such as COVID-19 is classified as a workplace hazard and the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 requires that employers take all practicable steps to mitigate risk and protect workers at all times from workplace hazards.

Business risks

A large proportion of workforce could be unwell at the same time which would result in a number of service failures. Your property management company may not have the personnel to provide all of your services. Suppliers and contractors may not be able to deliver their normal products and services.

What actions can you take to mitigate the risks?

  • Download our Contingency Plan template and use it.
  • Communicate the potential risk to your team
  • Allow staff to work from home where possible
  • Organise times for staff to get immunised
  • Establish your minimum essential services and devise a list of what and how staff redirect their time if required
  • Inform owners & tenants of a potentially longer than normal wait for addressing issues such as maintenance and repairs.
  • Adjust BDM strategy to be more digitally or telesales focused instead of networking or meetings.
  • Increase space between workstations
  • Implement alternative social practices e.g. no shaking hands or kissing
  • Avoid attending international conferences and unnecessary international travel at this time.
  • Where possible, buy increased levels of workplace supplies e.g. paper, toilet paper, hand cleaner
 

Final words

Kia tūpato! Be careful about how you talk about COVID-19. Please read this very important resource on how to avoid stigmatising people with the disease. Get your news from a trustworthy source. The Ministry of Health’s website has a lot of good information. 

Credit must go to Dr Siouxsie Wiles (@SiouxsieW) and Dr Reremoana Theodore (@MoanaTheodore) for pointing me in the right direction and providing valuable information.

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COVID-19: How to Grow Your Rent Roll in a Covid Lockdown

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