A good landlord to many people will be the one who rents out their property at a cheaper price. Well, it goes beyond that!

You do not want to be that landlord who only shows up when rent is due but takes forever to get maintenance work done on the property. Or you do not want to be a tenant, who creates problem for landlords, thus meqasa.com where you can browse through different kind of properties by different landowners and agents.

Every tenant has peculiar needs and it takes a  good landlord to identify and solve each of them.

Here are seven characteristics of a good landlord that ensures they have a blissful  relationship with their tenants:

• Professional: The way a landlord presents and carries himself around counts. You must exercise the highest level of professionalism in your dealings. Treating tenants with respect, being punctual, having the proper documentation of activities, and other paperwork readily available on request, neatly filing them until they are needed are traits of professionalism which will positively influence the decision of your prospective tenants.

• Good reputation: One key to developing a good reputation is making sure your tenants are content with your services. Never eliminate tenants on inappropriate grounds or take decisions to fulfill your selfish interest. This way, your tenants can give positive comments about you to prospective tenants.

• Reliability: How reliable are you? Do you keep your promises or you are the one who goes back on their promises? Answer phone calls and reply your emails from your tenants promptly if you are in the office and if you miss a call or an email, promptly return the call and reply the emails. You have to swiftly and properly do maintenance works and address issues of tenants when you have to.

• Trustworthy: Your tenants need to trust you if they are going to stay. Shoddy maintenance works and hiding things from them will go a long way to affect the trust they have for you. Telling them things as it is even though it is bad news will be appreciated rather than saying otherwise for the tenants to find out the truth later

• Communication: Nobody likes being  left in the dark or uninformed. To have a good landlord-tenant relationship, make sure there is  an open communication where tenants can comfortably share their views or opinions on how things should be done and on anything bordering them.

• Suitable Distance:  As a proprietor, avoid  ‘pestering’  your tenants and trying to micromanage their decisions. It becomes uncomfortable when you try to poke your nose  into the personal lives of your tenants.

•    Flexibility: One of the ways of being a good landlord is to be flexible. Uncertainties such as losing a job or relocating because of a job transfer can pop-up in the lives of your tenants. It will be appropriate to cut them some slack and they will forever be grateful for your consideration and will not have second thoughts when recommending you to prospective clients.

This post was put together by Samuel Tettey-Fio. Samuel is a third year student at Ghana Technology University College (GTUC) studying for a BSc. in Information Technology