CA+RMAP® - discover the joy of renting

THE SCHOOL OF HARD-KNOCKS

Years ago, I got into real estate investment by half accident, half curiosity. As a skilled independent immigrant, I had my fair share of earlier struggles. After 2-years, I obtained my Master degree and secured an engineer job in a big oil company with an excellent pay. I began to look around for something that can keep me challenged. 

One day during the lunch break, a colleague mentioned a book called “Rich Dad, Poor Dad”. Out of curiosity, I borrowed and read it shortly after.  All of sudden, a door opened and I saw a very different world – a place where money works hard for you instead you work hard for money, while pursuing your own dreams, freely.  

So I started my real estate investment journey with  a 2-bedroom condo. Before long, I started to taste the bitterness through the hard-knocks in the real life: 

• Tenants started to default on rents with all sort of excuses, this dragged on for months – then we went to inspect the houses, and shocked by the disaster scene inside – after tens of thousands of dollars unpaid rents and more spent to get the bad tenants out, to clean the mass and fix the damages, I thought this must be a bad luck… 
• Then we were so eager to recoup the losses – so we fooled ourselves with the quick possession by throwing all the rules, screening checks out of the window – no wander one after another dramas and fights were broke out and literally my daily life was being turned in to a “living hell”- the dreams of financial freedom had turned into endless nightmares and dreadful financial losses….

Out of desperation, we decided to hire professionals with the hope that I can finally enjoy wine far away on an ocean beach forever while having the pros  taking care of my rentals brilliantly, just like their website said? Not so simple. Again, life threw out a few more punches  and taught me the following:  

• It turned out many property managers were not necessarily preforming better than the landlords in any measurable means – a so-called “licensed property manager” hardly reflect any professional or better performance at all in the real life.  
• The PM fee/cost is hefty – 10% of the rents typically, this alone had eaten up the only positive cash flow to keep the rentals afloat.
• The maintenance costs are sky-rocketing due to the combination effects of careless tenants plus the fact that everything broken become wear-and-tear by default with no checks and reviews by the property managers.
• A use-to-be-profitable rentals all of sudden became a deep hole sucking out the money like one couldn’t believe….
• Another strange thing happened is that all of sudden, I, the landlord and property owner, had being totally cut off from my own properties and tenants – as your were forbidden to get in touch with your homes or tenants without the property managers in the middle – It is required by property management contract. It did not go well with me at all. I found myself had no idea on what was actually going on  in my own properties…
• On top of all the above, I found myself chasing after the property managers a lot – in other words, I had to manage the managers with growing frustration caused by unreturned phone calls, messages and emails, and tons of excuses. 

Simply put, average property management option did not work out for us in the end unfortunately.

(In all fairness, there are definitely property managers out there who may do a decent or even great job. However, later I have found out why inherently “property manager option” is less likely a great option to assist one’s true success in real estate investment (To learn more, you may check out “Culfidant Investment Success Index Analysis, or CIS index“)

Then something hit me again, more accurately, “nudged” me gently this time. 

One day I received a call from one of our tenants. She was ready to move-out after 7-year stay. Quite honest, all the bad tenants and mediocre property managers had consumed most of my time and sanity, I almost forgot her. So I set up a time to do a walk-through prior to her departure. 

I still remembered that day when I showed up in that house where the tenant’s family had stayed for 7 years (I confess, I did not bother to do even one-time inspection, not something I like to brag about or recommend at all. The fact that the home was “looking-great” was merely a dumb-luck):

The home was meticulously clean, it was definitely better than its condition 7 years ago, the yard was decorated with flower beds, which turned the yard into a beautiful garden. The tenants thanked me for allowing them staying and keeping rents with no actual change for years – then they offered something unexpected –

They were willing to show the house for us to the interested prospect tenants – two-month ahead of their departure date, in the hope to keep no vacancy right after their move-out. And yes, the home was rented right after their departure,  to another great family who fell in love with the home on the first sight, instantly. 

On the way back that day, I asked myself – What if every single tenant can be like this one – had paid rents on time every single month, cared the home with a great deal, and stayed for a long time without any trouble (7 years in this case)? further more, 

What should I do up front to  attract the tenants like that while keeping the bad ones away? Equally importantly, if not more, what should I do to make sure the great tenants can stay as long as they like?

That question lead to the birth of the concept of “A+ homes, tenants, and service “, and we began to develop the concept and system of CA+RMAP® over the next coming years. As the legend said, the rest was history. 

How is CA+RMAP® different?

There are 5 things separating CA+RMAP® from the traditional renting options (namely, DIY, or via property managers) 

1. Foundation – CA+RMAP® starts from 2 fundamentally different efforts first. Namely, how to be an A+ landlord, and how to transform an ordinary rental into an A+ home?
   • Instead of chasing quick rich solution, it focus on the long-term real estate investment success. It puts landlords on the driver-seats firmly to act as the true master of their own financial future, to share the care for the coming in A+ tenants, and to nurture a long term win-win.
   • It requires every landlord to make the most important decision – will you commit yourself to the vision of Culfidant, that is, the best way to achieve A+ investment result is to become A+ landlord, offer A+ homes, to serve with A+ service, for the A+ tenants to enjoy for the long-term?
2. Automation – Starting from the A+ home readiness, designated website pages, professional viewing/screening app, marketing package readiness, to automated inquiry reply; from imbedded multi-layer-AI assisted tenant screening and 6-factor-18-scoring system, to the application approval and lease sign-off, every step in the process has been automated with the state of art technologies. So instead of you spending endless hours on the phone to answer and repeating the same boring screening questions, or debating should you answer the phone call or email while you are at the work, CARMAP takes care of them all automatically, 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week, all you need is to simply lay back and watch the booked showings to be confirmed, the showing to be conducted, the application form to be filled and reviewed automatically. 
3. Rate of return – Based on our own experience in the real world, we have found the so called “Culfidant Investment Success Index, or CIS index, is a much more comprehensive way to make an apple to apple comparison when it comes to evaluate various investment options. In essence, the higher the CIS index, the better. For a detailed analysis on the CIS Index between CA+RMAP® and the other two traditional renting options of DIY or PM, You may review the detailed analysis here – It is a no-brainer. 
4. A+ learning/practice/growth – CA+RMAP® exclusive membership service understands the power of continually learning and grow for each and everyone of us – not only you can access unlimited and vast resources via our website and social media channels, participate various events, every member will also be “volunteer” to participate various real life property management related tasks on every step of the investment journey, to actually manage not only your own property, but the other members’ properties, under the guidelines of the Culfidant community best practice. 
5. 5-year guarantee – CARMAP service guarantees unlimited use whenever needed anytime during the five-year time period. your peace of mind is guaranteed. 

I hope by now – you are fully ready to explore the CA+RMAP® exclusive membership service step-by-step in detail, along with the benefits you may enjoy. Below is the break-down on how CA+RMAP® exclusive membership works.