First-Time Landlord: Your Guide to Renting out a Single-Family Home

Landlording 101 for new rental property owners who are firsttime landlords as a result of an inheritance, divorce, move to a new house, buying a duplex and renting out the extra unit, purchase for a family member (elderly parent or college student child), or buying a rental property house as an investment. Many of the readers are not only firsttimers, but they are accidental landlords who took on the task because they inherited a property or couldn’t sell their house at a decent price, so are renting it out. The book is for the millions of people who rent out single family homes and condos (not multiunit apartment buildings), while typically balancing a day job with landlord responsibilities. The audience is novice landlords who need basic business and legal advice on renting out and managing rental properties—different from landlords who consider themselves real estate investors.