How to Market Your Rental Property: A Landlord’s Guide

Getting your marketing right is vital if you’re going to make your buy to let property stand out in the crowd. Successful adverting ramps up interest, attracting the right tenants and giving you more choice over the best renters. Here we share our top tips on how to market your rental property to help you find the best tenants faster, and boost your rental yield in the process.

If you want to avoid rental voids, and boost your rental yield as a landlord, you’re going to need a robust strategy for marketing your property. Successful marketing is the best route to attracting the type of tenants that will stick around for the long term, pay their rent on time, and treat your property with respect. So with this in mind, let’s take a look at how to market your rental property for buy to let success.

Once you have researched your ideal target tenant, understood their needs and desires, and set your rental rate at just the right sweet spot so as to attract attention but also net yourself a decent return on investment, it’s time to start getting your property in front of potential tenants. This is where you have two main options.

The first option is to instruct a letting agent to market the property on your behalf. The second is to go down the route of marketing the property yourself. Your choice will depend upon the degree of involvement you want in your buy to let investment.

If you would rather take more of a hands-off approach, you’ll probably find it more beneficial to hand over to a letting agent. But if you have time on your hands, it may be that you decide you’ll give the marketing a go yourself. If that’s the case, the following advice is for you.

Define your selling points

You’re going to need to make your property stand out amongst the competition, and to do this you’ll need to define a few selling points that act to raise the profile of your rental.

Think about what your property has that others don’t, such as off-street parking, a private garden, proximity to transport links and local amenities, eco-friendly credentials or a pet-friendly policy. If your property is family-friendly, or ideal for students, those are good selling points to include too.

Craft a detailed property description

Your description will be your key sales tool for your rental property, so it needs to be both engaging, and informative. It should clearly feature the selling points that you have defined, as well as the key features of the property and information about the local area.

Your opening paragraph should provide a summary overview, focusing on the lifestyle aspects and highlighting the main selling points. Then you can follow up with more detail about the property, room-by-room. If you are presenting the property furnished, and you are supplying high end appliances, it can be an effective strategy to mention the brand names involved.

Be sure to cover what’s included in the rental rate, and when the property will be available.

Arrange quality photography

When it comes to how to market your rental property, photography is one of the key areas in which you will need to invest. It is well worth hiring a specialist property photographer who knows just how to get the best out of a home visually.

Be sure to include photographs of every room, any outdoor space, and the front aspect of the property, highlighting any special features. Wherever possible, organise the photo shoot for a sunny day, and spend some time staging the property to make it look as appealing as possible. Your aim is to showcase your property as somewhere people really want to live, so your photos will need to strike an emotional cord with potential tenants.

If your budget can stretch to it, consider 360° degree property photography. This will provide interactive, panoramic images that make the viewer feel like they are actually in the property. Always remember that first impressions count, so your photographs are going to play a crucial role in selling your rental to tenants.

Advertise your property

Most tenants these days will turn to the internet to source their perfect rental property. So you’re going to need a strong online presence to market your property effectively.

Online property portals such as Rightmove, Zoopla, Prime Location and On the Market are very popular, as they make it straightforward for renters to hone their search based on rental rate, location and other features. However, many of these portals won’t deal with landlords directly, so you may need to go through a letting agent, or instead use an online estate agent such as Upad or OpenRent.

Social media is another option and is fast becoming a popular medium for tenants searching for somewhere to live, particularly those looking to share accommodation.

Using social media can get you in front of large audiences, plus there’s the benefit of sharing and recommendations that are part and parcel of this medium. Joining online community groups will help get your property seen by local people. Make use of any contact tools, such as Facebook Messenger, and be sure to always reply to comments and enquiries in good time.

Homes2let offers a property management service that reduces the landlord burden, with an added benefit…

As a landlord, you have enough to deal with without having deal with deposit claims. So why not hand over to a property management service, but one with a clear added benefit?

The homes2let guaranteed rent scheme guarantees rental payments, even when the property is untenanted, as well as taking all the hassle of property management off your shoulders too.

Interested to discover more? You are welcome to get in touch with our expert team to discover how we can make your life as a landlord more of a breeze.

Rizwan Moledina

Riz is the founder of homes2let and has been in real estate for over twenty years. He has a background in economics and is a real estate developer and buy to let investor.

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