Investing in real estate properties in Cambodia is good, especially if you want financial freedom or to increase your profit margin. However, not everyone has the time on their hands to manage the properties they own, which is why property management exists. Since it’s a booming subset of the real estate industry in Cambodia, learn everything you need to know about it here.
What is a property manager?
Any person who has the responsibility of overseeing a property, from maintenance and more, is called a property manager. The typical responsibilities of a property manager are the following:
- Screens and looks for high-quality tenants
- Creates, signs, and reviews tenant lease terms
- Collects monthly rent
- Handles eviction of tenants
- Follows the budget strictly for the maintenance of properties.
What is property management?
The responsibility of looking over a property and ensuring that it’s maintained accordingly is called property management. Considering that properties tend to wear over time, repairs and maintenance are necessary to make sure a property looks like it had when it was first bought.
Generally, property management is a service offered by real estate companies, which experienced property managers handle. The properties that these companies can handle are residential, industrial, and commercial. In short, any property you have, a manager can manage it for you!
Not all properties need the same type of care since not all owners or investors require property managers to handle everything related to the property. There are some investors who only want the common spaces of their property to be maintained, private areas to be routinely checked, and more. These distinctions can be classified under two types of property management: physical and facility management.
Physical property management
If you need someone to take over caring for your property, specifically a residential home, then you need physical property management. It covers anything from ensuring the property is spotless, well-maintained, up until repairs are necessary. Moreover, consistent maintenance is conducted for the home to prevent bigger repairs later.
The typical residences that fall under this are condominiums, apartments, townhouses, commercial properties like shopping centers, and more.
Typically, the properties that need physical property management are investments, wherein the owner will open it up for rent. Acquiring the services of a real estate company that has property management is necessary especially for investors who have a full-time job and can’t handle the day-to-day tasks of managing their homes. Moreover, this is useful for investors who are overseas, whether they’re foreigners or locals who work out of the country.
Currently, we only offer physical property management to vertical properties, primarily apartments and condominiums so contact us now!
Facilities property management
When you need a dedicated property manager to oversee the facilities of your building, which can be anything from routine window cleaning to landscaping, then this falls under facilities property management. All areas of a building will be maintained by your dedicated property manager, whether that’s making sure the common areas are spotless, elevators are working properly, the lobby is maintained, and more.
Facilities property management is helpful in buildings where there are different properties that have individual owners, like a condominium. A homeowners’ association (HOA) that consists of all owners or investors chooses the property management company they want to oversee the facilities of their building. Maintenance of these common spaces are paid by the co-owners or included in the rental fee for tenants.
Property management fees: How does it work?
The idea of having a dedicated staff with years of experience to oversee your property isn’t as costly as you think. Property management fees in Cambodia only cost between $1 to $2 per square meter, although this is then multiplied to the gross area.
Take note that the gross area factors in the size of the unit as well as the share of the common area. So for example, you have a 30 square meter unit and a share of the common area of 20 square meters, then your gross area is 50 square meters. Then if the management fee is $2, you can multiply it to the gross area, and you’d get a total of $100 in management fees in a month.
Total management fee per month = Gross area x management fee per square meter
The management fee is used primarily to maintain the property within a month. However, there are some developers or investors who want a part of the management fee to be allocated to a Sinking Fund, which is money set aside to be used for expenses not included in the budget or unforeseen ones.
However, the typical $1 to $2 management fee per gross area only covers the basic maintenance and overseeing of these properties. If you need your property manager to look for high-quality tenants for your unit, handle eviction, or collect rent, this will be an additional payment to their services. Typically, this is an additional 10% of the current management fee.
Once you’ve decided that your properties need an experienced and dedicated staff to oversee them, make sure to contact us to get a quote for your properties!
KH