Once you have organised your buy to let mortgage, making sure you have the best deal on your property investment, it is time to bring in tenants to your property and start making a rental income to cover your mortgage payments. Reliable tenants who pay rent on time, honour their contracts and respect your property can be hard to find, so here are some top tips to help find great tenants as you start out.

Finding tenants for your buy to let property

It is likely that your property will appeal to certain types of tenants more than others. You may have a property with four or five bedrooms, ideal for a group of students. In order to attract the right market to your buy to let property, it is a good idea to advertise in places your ideal tenants will see. So, in the case of students, you could advertise in student publications, or on college notice boards. Some universities in particular publish a yearly list of recommended private landlords for students who do not wish to use an estate agent; getting on these lists can be invaluable.

If, rather than finding tenants yourself, you would rather use a letting agent, do not trust them implicitly. Ask other landlords and read up about the agents on the internet to ensure they are trustworthy; agents who simply want to fill your property may not be scrupulous about the tenants they provide.

A good way to find out about your tenants, even if you are using an agent, is to meet them, show them around the property and chat to them yourself. This way you can put faces to the names, and try to get a sense of how reliable they are before you go any further.

You are perfectly within your rights to obtain references from tenants. These will provide you with more information than a casual chat can. If at all possible, you may find it useful to speak directly to your prospective tenants’ former landlords. This way, you can find out if the tenants have been swift with payments in the past, and any problems landlords have had with them, such as damage to the property.

Once you have chosen the tenants for your buy to let property, it is important to protect both your rights, and those of your tenants, with a tenancy agreement. This will avoid disputes about who has responsibility about the property later on. If you are not familiar with legal documents, there is no need to feel intimidated. You can download standard tenancy agreements from the internet and they are normally on sale in most good bookshops.

If your tenants still develop payment problems, the key is to stay calm, but act quickly. The further into arrears you allow your tenants become, the larger the amount they will owe you, and thus the more difficult it will be for them to pay. If you are unhelpful or threatening, tenants are less likely to co-operate, so remember to keep a cool head in order to get your money back and protect your investment.