First rental property mistakes I've made and the lessons I learned on how to be a landlord. These are 5 landlord lessons I wish I had known before being a landlord in my 20’s and why learning these TODAY will help you know how to invest in real estate in 2021 and be a better landlord and property investor in the future. 🏘️ Property Accelerator 🏘️ Learn how to build a profitable property investment portfolio from scratch! Build a passive income, that has the potential to replace your earned salary, starting with £40,000. (£100 off Coupon: 100off) 👉 https://www.propertyinvestingwealth.com/accelerator 👉: https://www.instagram.com/stephen_duncombe/ First, being a landlord comes with it a certain amount of responsibility and if you want to make less mistakes from the start, being clear on what real estate to buy, will ensure you don’t make financial mistakes that cause you to make poor decisions as a land lord. To be clear on your first real estate investment, you’ll need to create a Deal Profile to identify what type of property you want and what type of investor you want to become. This will dictate how much work you do as a property landlord and how much money you make from each of your property investments. Creating a Deal Profile will take all the emotion out of buying an investment property and set you up to being a better landlord that makes money. Secondly I made the mistake of trying to manage my properties after a while and decided the additional money was not worth the additional aggravation that comes with it and the extra responsibilities. Getting a professional management company has been the best decision I made. Setting up front rules about cost approvals will also allow your property manager to be responsive to your tenants so everyone remains happy and your tenants ideally stay longer in your investment property. Thirdly, as a property landlord you need to factor in maintenance and repairs as part of your due diligence when buying property and to manage maintenance and repair costs when owning a property as a landlord. These costs will be driven by the type of property you buy and the tenant you accept into the property. Being clear on your tenant choice as part of your Deal Profile will help you keep your maintenance and repair costs down and your return on investment up. Fourthly, choosing to buy leasehold properties in the UK or HOA properties in the US, come with them additional annual charges called service charges and sinking funds. These charges are passed on to leaseholders from management companies who run the building and look after the shared components of it that all properties benefit from such as the roof, lifts, corridor lights, etc. Checking the costs of service charges and sinking funds prior to becoming a landlord will set you up for success as if you ignore these you could be entering into a leasehold nightmare which we have seen recently with those properties in the UK that have external cladding that is not fire proof rated. And last but not least buying a property for investment purposes as a new landlord carries with it certain income tax implications. Our experience tells us that buying property as a new landlord investor, will normally be more tax efficient when the purchase is made in a LIMITED company name instead of a personal name. Seek advise from your accountant about your personal situation. Maintaining property in your own name will also increase the amount of income you generate and therefore could move you into a higher rate tax bracket, again something to be aware of as a new landlord.