At the spectrum for who can afford to buy house, can only afford less and less of down payment

At the spectrum for who can only afford to rent house, can only afford less and less of deposit.

The initial upfront is the killer for both house buyer and tenant. And btw, do not penalise all genuine tenants just because of some bad apples.

Therefore we came up with solution to solve this problem. Allianz General Insurance is bridging this so that everyone can move forward with the future trend with ease.

We barely know the world we live in, things are changing so rapidly. We cannot use the lenses of the past to see the future. But we certainly can give the benefit of doubt for whatever innovation is in the market and give it a try, because end of the day, nothing really really bad can happen.

Yes, consent is required for the check.

Currently monthly rental that we do is between RM1 - 4k/mo. Not open for high rental yet.

That's correct, and 2 demand letter from law firm.

Noted, we will add more questions before they submit enquiry.

We will also start selectively credit check on tenant in coming months.

We understand that there is still an education gap needed, hence we have customer service rep to help both landlord and tenant.

Right now there is somewhat handholding process for all of the steps mentioned.

It's true that Speedrent charges one month rent. However, we charge the 12th month rent.

So if a tenant fail to complete their 12 months agreement, you do not pay anything at all.

Point taken, would strengthen this process further.

We have an appointment feature - just that most are unaware of it / just exchange phone number and make appointment externally.

We will need to do something about it, if you have any idea - would love to hear from you!

I saw some feedback here and mostly negative experience with Speedrent. I believe most of them were genuine feedback but some were very wrong.

First of all, I wish to explain what Speedrent is really about.

It started with a simple frustration. I needed to lease my house in 2014 ASAP, contacted 50 agents through SMS, 10 responded, and ONLY 2 came to take photo of my unit. 1 month later, it was rented out. Towards the 4th/5th month, I've had rental collection issue, agent didn't bother to help. Fortunately the tenant was oversea and therefore didn't pay on time.

But during the moment of frustration, I thought:

What if I only SMS 10 agents and none of them responded?
Why am I paying the fees to agent when there is zero after-sales service, especially when I needed them the most?

That got me started to think.

Is there any platform that is especially designed for landlord to manage their rental house easily and deal with all the hassle, I would pay for it because property rental is suppose to be a god damn passive income! And that became the vision guiding me in building Speedrent as the dream of all landlords.

There were a lot of outdated information in this thread. And I have myself to blame for not following up this thread closely. More importantly, there is limited information on our website and everyone took all opinions here as what Speedrent is. I started responding in Aug, and we are in the midst of creating a lot of articles to explain what Speedrent is. But since it's not fast enough, I'll write few simple answers for everyone to read. My response may be aggressive in certain answers, but I wish all landlord read it with an open mind.

Click on the below links for whichever topic that you are interested in:

Customer Service False Information / Delayed Rental Payment
Speedrent not working, no tenant at all!
Speedrent = Agent? Use Agent better?
The killer No Deposit, sounds like a scam
How does Speedrent Tenancy Agreement work, esp Termination

I can be reached at wm@speedrent.com or 0192679338.

This post has been edited by wheimeng: Aug 24 2017, 05:58 AM

Added your question to my main response, you can read here.

gks, yes, that's always the plan to grow. There is a lot of new concept and the way we think about rental. And we need to do a lot of education work, as well as support from landlord and tenant!

Thanks for your encouragement and keep the feedback coming back.

We started with credit card but found out that penetration of credit card is fairly low (20-30%). Credit card can help us to collect rental more promptly, and there are declined credit cards whenever we try to charge. So not a foolproof solution.

Credit card and cash are a mean to payment, not the ultimate solution to timeliness. Our current experience is most tenants pay on time, through online banking or cash deposit.

So yes, credit card in a generalised view has better predictability compared to other means, but it's not guaranteed (e.g., exceeded credit limit).

We do not see Speedrent as biased towards tenants. In fact, we see our solution is a better solution for both landlord and tenant. Deposit is a legacy solution that does not protect landlord well, and at the same time create financial burden for the tenants.

e.g., the deposit does not cover damages well, especially we have heard so many landlord stories on tenant wrecked the house/furniture that costs them 5 figures easily.

The insurance that Speedrent worked out with Allianz, offers superior protection to landlord (2 months rental guarantee + RM15000 damage/theft on household content + RM1000 inconvenience benefit + 2x demand letter), while at the same time removing financial burden for tenant.

It's a fairer and better solution for both parties.

Sorry to hear your experience. We will have option soon to verify tenant identity, safe, easy and transparent are the 3 key elements that we want to offer.

We expect by Nov this feature will be available to all. By then, hopefully you feel more secured in using Speedrent.

Thank you for your feedback, truly appreciate it!

p/s: CIMB discount has expired, no longer have that.

@david77

1. Fee - basically no different from using agent, just that benefit in timing (pay later rather than upon signing tenancy agreements)

Yes, that's true. But there is a big difference in later (last month vs agent first month)

Traditionally, you pay first month to agent upon finding a tenant. Speedrent you pay the last month upon tenant successfully completed the tenancy.

If a tenant, for whatever reason does not complete the agreed term, you have 1 month less. Where else at Speedrent, you don't pay for anything. Entire service is FOC to you.

2. Insurance - at landlord cost but Speedrent gets commission

Refer to 1. If a tenant doesn't complete the agreed term, insurance will be FOC for you.

3. Deposit - if tenant goes rogue, Speedrent pays using the deposit. If tenant is good, Speedrent gets to use the deposit for its investment. So it's opportunity cost to landlord.

Landlord tends to focus on the opportunity cost (losses) paying to a person who provide service. But what I wish to highlight, the real opportunity cost is leaving the house idle (1 month? 2 months or even 6 months rental losses?), not generating the cash flow (or rental yield) as a result of delayed rental.

IMO, that is where the real opportunity cost people are sacrificing.

As a property investor, rental yield / generating cash flow is the key focus. A person can potentially save a penny here and there, but losing a pound. Hope that answers your question.

What do you think?

@heavenly91

1. We like to use credit scoring as a mean to predict a person's behaviour. Is that foolproof? No, but we are emulating the process of a bank approving a loan to property rental.

2. We advertise on Facebook, Google to attract tenant. Right now we perform credit screening and background check when both landlord and tenant decided to do a deal. In Nov, we will move the credit screening process upfront, in hope to filter a poor scoring tenant before they get to you. @ken12345 asked this question too.

3. Yes, by default, all rental will flow through Speedrent before going to landlord. So that when a tenant doesn't pay rental on time, we know it and can act on it. Part of the insurance coverage also have lawyers to send demand letter to tenant when they are overdue.

And for the 1 month fee, as mentioned to @david77 - you don't pay for the fee when tenant run away because you only pay when the tenant successfully completed the term of stay.

Yup yup.

Owner.

Glad that you are clearer on our business model, and Speedrent is not for everyone. It's always a channel for landlords to try other options.

p/s: I've not claimed that Speedrent was faster to agent.

So sorry for the late response, I've not received any email notification on all these questions. I've now set my calendar to check LYN on a weekly basis.

Few questions here, and I will address them all:

Q: How much & Where is the fee structure? Is it 1 month as stated in this forum, but it is not stated in the apps. Will i get an invoice so that i can deduct my tax.

A: The simple answer is 1 month, but I encourage you to read the details at: https://speedrent.com/web/happy-landlord-guidebook/

Q: Normally landlord pay 1 month rental to agent for a 2 years contract. If we have to pay Speedrent 1 month for 1 year contract, means i have to pay double. Can we deal direct with tenant after the 1 year?

A: Certainly!

Q: hello, is that possible to filter out tenants based on their nationality? not to be racist but based on the experience i would prefer to rent out to locals or professionals. 
is there any maximum or minimum on tenancy terms? will u prepare a standardize tenancy agreement on behalf? Thanks.

A: We do not have filter tenant based on nationality. Min 6 and max 12 months. And yes, it's a standardised tenancy agreement, you can DIY it easily, check out the tutorial at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJDfJRGuYS4

Q: Then again at the website it says tenant pays RM399 for the tenancy agreement. So now does the tenant only pay 10% of the rental or does he also have to pay one month rental to Speedrent for its services and RM399 for the tenancy agreement (tenant has to pay bcs the agreement actually protects the tenant)???

A: 10% is 2016 news. We have changed the model since March 2017, no 10% charge on tenant.

Q: I was discussed few times with speedrent guys. They're only think about tenants side and whole processes are favorite to tenants. I am not sure speedrent guys got landlord experiences or not. All i can sense they have ton of tenants experiences. 

A: You can read https://speedrent.com/web/happy-landlord-guidebook/ for full landlord experience and benefits.

This post has been edited by wheimeng: Feb 18 2018, 07:42 AM

Hi truelife,

Speedrent transfers the payment directly to landlord upon tenant pays the rental within 3 working days.

We send SMS, email and calls to tenant when they do not pay on time. Our SOP is to call tenant it becomes overdue.

Last year, many landlords called Speedrent to ask for because there wasn't any visibility to our course of action for late payment. For that, we have built a system for landlords to check for all activities we do on landlord's behalf for full transparency. You can read more at https://speedrent.com/web/checking-tenants-payment-status/

This post has been edited by wheimeng: Feb 18 2018, 07:39 AM

That's the whole point of Allianz insurance. In fact, Speedrent will help to process the claim from Allianz when the tenant has ran away.

@truelife, you can read more at https://speedrent.com/web/speedrent-allianz...ental-coverage/