In my rooming house, there's an older gentlemen who gets around 1200 a month in SSI and has been a very low maintenance tenant. There was a hick up a few months back with him and his suite mate, but since she's left, everything has been pretty quiet. I'd like to approach him to be a resident assistant to take a few things off of my plate. Here's what I want him to do:

1) Clean common areas of the rooming house and a couple of other properties.

2) Assist me in showing vacant rooms and vetting tenants.

3) Monitor house rules infractions and inform me for resolution. I handle the resolution.

4) Handle turnover of rooms (cleaning, minor repairs and etc.)

5) Miscellaneous stuff as assigned.

This job will require 5-10 hours a month. I'm thinking of paying him $ 200 a month. This would effectively reduce his rent to $ 450 a month. He's on SSI and gets about 1200 a month, so I'm sure he could use the bucks. He has a decent car which would allow him to go around to my places. Most of the cleaning stuff would be once or twice a month.

Thoughts?

Make him your eyes and ears. Don't make him your decision maker.....I know that sounds silly at this point, but if he does a good job you will trust his judgement.

1) Clean common areas of the rooming house and a couple of other properties.

2) Assist me by showing vacant rooms and providing applications (filled out ones go into drop box for you to collect. You don't want him having personal info)

3) Monitor house rules infractions and inform me for resolution. I handle the resolution.

4) Handle turnover of rooms (cleaning, minor repairs and etc.)

5) Miscellaneous stuff as assigned

I guess it depends on how truly trustworthy he is, which is hard to judge ahead of time. I can understand how helpful some of that would be.

I suggest starting with just a little bit, like have hime show vacant rooms and hand out information. See how he handles that, before adding too much more. Might give him $5 per showing (or so) - but must monitor closely that they are all legitimate showings that have been pre-screened by you. If he has the key to vacant rooms, need to be sure nothing / no-one is put in there unauthorized.

Regarding cleaning: I would start just having him clean turnovers, $x each time. If he is THE one responsible for cleaning common areas, it MAY make the others feel like they can be slobs, and lead to arguments.

Hopefully, all the roomers will tell if someone is not acting right / cleaning up after themselves - but of course, the "I'm not a snitch" attitude can be there.

I tell all roomers before they move in that I need them to tell me if there is something they can not work out with another roomer. I tell them to talk / leave a note first, and do all they can to "remind" the other party they need to straighten up, but if they cannot work it out I need to know - I don't need to tell who reported it. I put it in the context of would rather have to lose one problem roomer rather than the other good ones (of course, assuming YOU will be a good one ; )

I have actually had to non-renew some because of their behavior, after it was first reported by a fellow roomer - and of course after I investigated and found supporting evidence.

Nicole, your previous comments and those above weighed heavily in this. One thing about doing this myself first is that I have a clear idea of what I need to have done. So it's me crafting the job rather than the other way around. I plan on keeping this guy on a short lease and out of a decision making role. He'll be supporting my decisions. He's what he's not in charge of:

1) Evictions

2) Tenant approval and vetting: I normally pre-screen applicants before agreeing to show. Once they go through the pre-screen, I'd have them schedule a showing with him. His role will simply be to show the unit and collect the completed application. If someone passes the pre-screen, they're 99% done. Having him on site to show the unit and collect the application would save me a lot of time.

3) Collections: All collections will move to electronic forms or direct deposit into my account.

4) Sanctions for violations of house rules: He tells me about them and I'll deal with the offender.

I am not all that sure about the amount of time you are allocating to these task. 5 to 10 hrs per month to do turn over maintenance along with four other line items.

The task you have to have him doing has to be basic clean up of some common areas.

Ray: