Why We Recommend The Ontario Landlords Association
Being a landlord in Toronto and in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) can be a very rewarding a profitable business in 2014!
Publications such as TheGRIDTO have headlines asking “Toronto Apartment Rentals – How Did They Get So Nuts?”
Real estate prices are rising and there are a lot of great tenants out there looking to rent.
If you are a professional, knowledgeable landlord with a great property and a fair rent price things haven’t been better in years.
With prices still rising and a low vacancy rate owning residential rentals properties in Toronto and the GTA is proving to be a great investment.
Professional Tenants
There are still dangers being an Ontario landlord.
This includes a rent increase guideline of only 0.8% that has some Ottawa landlords discussing moving to commercial properties.
It also includes the dangers of ‘professional tenants’ who know how to play every game and manipulate you and the Residential Tenancy Act.
You only need to open a local newspaper to read about these professional tenants who end up making their landlord lose lots of money along with giving the landlord months of anxiety.
Even a Superior Court judge criticized the Ontario Landlord and Tenant Board for allowing pro tenants such a great opportunity to cause grief and huge financial losses for landlords.
One of the worst things is that these pro tenants like to target small landlords.
How Can You Protect Yourself?
One of the key ways to protect yourself is by joining a landlord association.
Unfortunately, the old school landlord associations focus more on large corporate landlords and not small landlords.
Despite their marketing, these old associations are not run by experienced small landlords who know what other small landlords need to succeed.
Review of Ontario Landlords Association Membership
The Ontario Landlords Association was created by a group of experienced and successful small and medium sized landlords.
Their goal was to help small landlords across Ontario network together, help each other, create a landlord community and have create a united “voice” so the government and media could finally know the challenges small landlords in Ontario faced.
And it worked!
For the first time small landlords were able to get their stories out to the government and the media.
Whether it was issues regarding bedbugs or problems with the Landlord and Tenant Board, the Ontario Landlords Association got our side of the story out there.
This Toronto Sun article on the 2014 rent increase guideline shows you how important it is that small landlords finally have this voice.
Even the Ontario government quickly recognized the importance of the Ontario Landlords Association as a voice for small private residential landlords and an appreciation of what we offer.
What Tools and Services Does Ontario Landlords Association Membership Offer?
As the group of landlords grew larger they began to offer tools and services to help small landlords succeed.
Knowing small landlords are on a tight budget and cash-flow is tight, the fees for top-flight services were strongly negotiated to get the lowest prices possible for incredible services.
Why Should You Become a Member of the Ontario Landlords Association?
There are a whole lot of reasons.
These include:
1. You only pay a one-time fee to become a member
Landlords are on tight budgets and want to save money at all times.
You can become an Ontario Landlords Association member for a one-time fee of only $99.
There are no annual fees!
Just enough to cover the costs of running the site.
This is because the Ontario Landlords Association was created to help landlords and develop a large community of landlords to create a strong ‘voice’.
2. Network with thousands of other landlords
The Ontario Landlord Association forum is the largest forum in Canada.
There are thousands of members in the Private Members forum networking and helping each other outside of the eyes of the general public.
3. Tenant Credit checks
The Ontario Landlords Association offers the best landlord credit checks in Canada.
You can use TVS, Equifax or GARDA at a huge discount per check.
4. Get access to leases, applications & more in the Rental Kit
The Ontario Landlords Associations landlords our own ‘online rental kit library’ that can be accessed 24/7 from your home or office computer.
You can choose from a large number of leases, applications and everything you need anytime you want to.
No need for photocopying because you can just download anytime!
5. Landlord Guidebooks and Landlord Manuals
Members of the Ontario Landlords Association can download guidebooks and manuals on topics such as tenant screening and advertising.
Unlike the government sites, these guidebooks and manuals tell the ‘real story’.
And unlike for profit real estate sites like REIN these are not ‘sales books’ looking for you to invest in any type of investment or service.
We Strongly Recommend Membership with the Ontario Landlords Association
For only a low one-time fee you get access to tremendous services at terrific prices. We’ve written before how important tenant credit checks are.
Joining the Ontario Landlords Association is the deal of a lifetime for Ontario landlords and will help you and your landlord business succeed.
