Insane Landlords

[YanquiGallego]

Like I said, the short-term rental market in BA is a wonderful thing and a downright lifesaver for those who dont have guarantees, those who genuinely plan to stay a short amount of time, or simply those of us who dont feel like schlepping all over BA to buy furniture that is less quality than Ikea at Ethan Allen prices, and I have nothing but the utmost respect for realtors.

Regardless of whether it´s lucrative to owners/landlords or not to rent short term to tenants, I personally do not know first-hand, none of the costs/expenses you mentioned are unique to owning a place in just Buenos Aires.

However I am assuming that by the 100+ listings of short-term rentals listed on Craig´s List a day, it must be somewhat of a lucrative business to get into. The short term rental of a place can also mean weekly renting, which at around $450-$500 USD a week, I´d say is a pretty nice bit of change.

My original comment wasnt intended to diss realtors nor the industry in general, it was to comment on the OP´s situation with their particular landlord. As a newbie to post but a longtime lurker, I know that one only has to skim through dozens of former posts on this forum to read horror stories about deposits not being returned, false/exaggerated claims of apartment damage, etc.
I dont doubt that there are plenty of positive stories as well, we just dont hear about them as often.

 

[TheBlackHand]

I can't really reply to uneducated guesses or simple assumptions. I simply stated the facts. Facts that a well respected Remax Realtor Perry confirmed. Good look with the guestimations though.

Regards.

 

[YanquiGallego]

thank you Blackhand, in all of my posts I have reiterated clearly that I do not claim to be an expert in professional real estate, so I am glad that realtors such as Perry and yourself--I didnt catch if you are a realtor too,--but nevertheless, I am glad that we can get points of view from all sides of the table.

I´m simply speaking from a consumer point of view and personal experience of someone who, as a tenant, has been around the block in all sorts of rentals, both long and short term, furnished and unfurnished, basic and luxury, garantia and without, honest and dishonest landlords, in a wide variety of markets on 3 continents.

And while the figures might have been obviously ¨guestimates¨ since I have never been in the role of realtor/landlord/owner, the overall consensus I dont find to be that completely off-base.

I love BA, but in my particular situation and that of many of my friends, the actual process of searching for a place and the process once actually in the new place, has been the equivalent of getting a tooth pulled. <---That is personal experience and opinion, and no, neither my friends nor I used a realtor with a good international reputation such as ReMax, and I am sure if we did the situation would have been a different one.

 

[citygirl]

You know - it's interesting to me. I moved to Argentina almost 5 years ago. In my time here, and in the 3 trips I made her prior to moving, I'd say I rented probably 10 apt or so. Originally, I used a broker and after I got a sense of the areas, I rented directly from the owners. In each case, I got my deposit fully returned. My friends who rent out apts have always returned deposits (to the point of insanity I think given how some of the tenants have left their apts).

I'll go out on a limb and yes, I'm generalizing. If you are someone with experience renting apts, you treat the apts as a home, not as someone else's problem and leave it in the same condition you found it it, you probably won't have problems. I think there are a lot of issues with tenants (esp young, just out of college kids) who come here, rent a place and while maybe not being completely irresponsible, don't take care of it.

If I rented out an apt (and forgive me OP) and 2 weeks before a tenant left, I came to show the apt to a new tenant and found curtains pulled down, walls that needed painting, gouges on the floor, an oven pretty much ruined aesthetically because of the rust on the door and comments being made (however innocently) about a parking space being difficult to park in when they weren't entitled to the use of it - I would be really upset as well.

ETA - I'm sure the OP is going to do all the repairs and not implying they are bad tenants. Just pointing out that if an owner doesn't know you that well, he or she might assume the worst.

I'll certainly acknowledge there are terrible owners who take advantage of people, esp tourists in the sense that they don't return deposits. (As Perry said, prices for short-term rentals are the same for Argentines or foreigners). There are IMO, as many terrible tenants who completely take advantage of landlords and leave them on the hook for damages that a security deposit can't even begin to cover.

 

[Sockhopper]

littleba, I can't tell much from your oversized photos but one thing in them made me a little squeamish - all the food piled on top of the fridge made me think, "bugs". Why is it up there rather than stored?

Knowing as you did that someone was coming to view the apartment, why didn't you tidy things and hook the curtains back up somehow or buy a new curtain rod? (Oh right, you've already said that the curtains aren't fit to rehang because you need to replace them.)

 

[steveinbsas]

Like I said, the short-term rental market in BA is a wonderful thing and a downright lifesaver for those who dont have guarantees, those who genuinely plan to stay a short amount of time, or simply those of us who dont feel like schlepping all over BA to buy furniture that is less quality than Ikea at Ethan Allen prices, and I have nothing but the utmost respect for realtors.

Please tell us how they gained your respect.

However I am assuming that by the 100+ listings of short-term rentals listed on Craig´s List a day, it must be somewhat of a lucrative business to get into. The short term rental of a place can also mean weekly renting, which at around $450-$500 USD a week, I´d say is a pretty nice bit of change.

Your assumption is based on what percentage of occupancy?

 

[steveinbsas]

I love BA, but in my particular situation and that of many of my friends, the actual process of searching for a place and the process once actually in the new place, has been the equivalent of getting a tooth pulled. <---That is personal experience and opinion, and no, neither my friends nor I used a realtor with a good international reputation such as ReMax, and I am sure if we did the situation would have been a different one.

Perry (a ReMax rep) doesn't treat potential renters any differently than potential buyers or sellers.

Next time call him first.

As a seller I learned this the hard way, too.

He has my upmost respect.

 

[Raymond]

I could suggest employing the San Telmo Screamer to fill-in for you the next round, he has years of experience and can even upset dogs up to 8548hz once he gets going

 

[RichardP]

Raymond, could you tell us about this Screamer? I just informed the landlady that we will be leaving in a timely manner and she suddenly became irrational and is making some weird and unfounded claims. Though we are leaving the apartment in better condition than when we moved in and have paid the rent in advance, she is talking about how some money is still owed to her and how she had to turn other people down in order to rent to us and that we are big fat liars, etc. My wife is Argentine and can scream with the best of them, but it might help to have a back up plan just in in case.

 

[RichardP]

Oh man, this is the person I rented from, but at a different address than in this post:
http://www.tripadvisor.in/ShowTopic...87-Buenos_Aires_Capital_Federal_District.html



Note: This has nothing to do with the agency but rather the owner in question.