Characteristics of a Good Property Manager

Our Services

Many years ago, my parents relocated from Montreal to Toronto due to my father’s work which was with the Federal government. At that time my parents owned two buildings - - both triplexes. Due to several factors such as the then weak real estate market, their uncertainty whether Toronto would prove to be a good home as well as other factors made them decide not to sell the properties.

After several months of trying to manage the buildings from Toronto (600 km away) they saw that the great challenges of doing so proved much too large to overcome. They had no network of friends or family willing to help nor were they willing to ask for this magnitude of favor from them. Professional property managers that they contacted either wanted to charge exorbitant rates or simply flat-out refused managing anything smaller than 10 unit buildings. There was indeed a tremendous market need immediately identified by my father.

As Kaur Property Management was launched in Montreal, Quebec, its goal was to meet the needs of property owners that had relatively small investment buildings to be managed honestly, professionally and with little effort for the owners, who likely were out of town. It was said that Kaur Property Management would be like those trusted friends or families that did not exist or that were not asked to help manage the buildings.

Today, we manage several properties big and small for owners that live in Montreal or away. Our owners understand that they have made the right choice in selecting our services. We are a small company and choose to remain small to continue to manage the needs of our customers with quality and care. No task, no job, no matter the complexity is too big for us to manage.

Our full service package ensures that owners have a reliable resource to entirely manage every aspect of the property from rent collection, repairs and renovations, finding new tenants to end-of-year tax slip preparation and renewal management. This is what we desperately needed so many years ago. This is now who we are.

Moving Day Surprises

It's moving season in Quebec once again, that time of year when a large percentage of the population relocates to new housing. For owners of large apartment buildings now is the time to deal with new tenants arriving, old tenants departing, inspection of apartment units and
renovations.

Last week a dear old lady moved out from one of my 2 bedroom apartments. The sweetest lady, she rarely complained, always paid on time and was like everyone’s grandmother in the building. However, the sweet grandmother image I had of her quickly faded into one of the Wicked Witch when we inspected her place after her departure! It was as if she put on her coat, took one last look of her apartment over her shoulder and literally walked out of her apartment.
Everything, and I mean everything was left - - furniture, carpets, kitchenware, bathroom ware, clothes, old stereos, blinds, chairs, tables, pictures, etc …..

More bad news for us, the condition of the apartment was horrendous! Every wall it seemed had a dozen nails with a different grandchild’s picture hanging. Even though she had lived in the unit for only 2 years, the walls were filthy dirty, the hard wood floor was scratched and the light fixtures were either missing or broken. In Quebec, collecting a security deposit is illegal so many of us owners get put in a financial bind with situations like this.

My team spent two hours removing and throwing her junk out of the apartment. Now starts the much-needed renovations to get the place on the market.