Questions to Ask When Qualifying a Vendor

Property managers and landlords should know who to trust when it comes to property maintenance. Here are some questions to ask when qualifying a vendor.

Who are vendors?

Vendors are the people that go into your house and provide service. These can be plumbers, electricians, handymen, or appliance technicians. We need to make sure that they are qualified in advance because there are horror stories of people doing things like breaking in later on because they see items in the house that are worth value, harassing tenants, not doing the work, and creating other issues such as leaks within the unit, and then not having insurance with it. Again, not doing a good job.

These are all things that are a nightmare for our landlord, and even for a property manager. Our job is to continually improve our vendors as well as the quality of the service that we provide to you.

So today, we share with you some questions to ask and think about when qualifying a vendor.

#1  How do they handle emergencies?

First and foremost, sit down with them, and ask them how many days in advance are they booking out. Is it two weeks or three weeks? If you have an emergency, do they have a team that can handle it? How do we reach them if there is an emergency? Can we reach them if they are on vacation or are there people to back them up? How do they provide updates? Do they provide pictures?

We ask for pictures for every single job that gets done, and we make sure that in our software, they mark it all.

#2 What are their rates?

We want to make sure that we know their rates in advance. You may say, “Oh, well, this guy seems really cheap. It’s $95 an hour.” But the guy takes 6 hours to get there to do the work and never gets completed. Again, the rate doesn’t matter. It is how quickly they get to it, how efficiently they can solve it, and, more importantly, that they can solve the issue.

#3 How is their working relationship with tenants and property managers?

In addition, you can give them keys to the property, or do they prefer picking up keys from the office? We have even had vendors that ask us to sit at the property with them while they do the work. That is not necessary when you trust them, but you want to have vendors that are presentable. Do they wear uniforms? Or at least, do they clearly designate that they work for a certain company? You can let your tenants know in advance that this company is coming so they will not be surprised and make sure that they talk about what they need to.

Our commitment

If you or anyone else you know is looking for a property manager that can help you in pre-qualifying a vendor, make sure that you have good vendors going into your house, and more importantly, that your repairs are taken care of, please think of Green Ocean Property Management: where you get more than a property manager, you get peace of mind.

For local trade contacts, owners and boards can also browse the Green Ocean trusted vendor directory. Confirm each vendor’s current licensing, insurance, pricing, and availability before hiring.