Time is money? Well yes, but did you ever use money to buy more time-saving services? It’s certainly possible with your rental property, and there are many time-saving tips and advice we can give you as well.
But will buying time – which is obviously finite – make you happier (and less stressed)?
Using money to buy more free time is linked to increased happiness according to recent studies published by the National Academy of Sciences.
The studies found that people who paid for time-consuming chores to be done, rather than spending their money on material goods, experienced greater happiness.
The UK Landlord Survey by Homelet, which surveyed over 3,000 landlords in January 2017, then revealed that 60.7% landlords who use a letting agent’s services use a fully managed service – thus having more free time!
And here’s an interesting comparison from the same Homelet report:
- Almost half 49.7% of the landlords own one rental property (61.8% using a fully managed service)
- Over a quarter 26.7% own 2–3 properties (48% using a fully managed service).
That means that many landlords tend to take on the property management chores themselves – and this is linked to the more properties they have. Very interesting for us to see that, and we believe these are mostly retired landlords with more free time to spare!
When you consider that psychologists say that increased stress caused by increasing demands, leading to lack of time (or ‘time famine’) contributes to lower well-being and insomnia – some landlords are probably experiencing less sleep and more stress. Even more amazing is that apparently even the very wealthy are often reluctant to pay people to do the jobs they dislike!
In the ‘Happiness Study’ more than 6,000 adults (including 800 millionaires) in the US, Canada, Denmark and the Netherlands were questioned about how much money they spent on buying free time. Less than a third spent money to pay people to do the jobs they disliked – such as cleaning, deliveries and other property-associated chores.
The ‘happiness’ research found that money spent on time-saving services, compared with material purchases, increased happiness by reducing feelings of time stress.
Professor Elizabeth Dunn, who worked on the research, said “… my take home message is ‘think about it, is there something you hate doing that fills you with dread and could you pay somebody else to do that for you?’ If so, then science says that’s a pretty good use of money.”
Do the day-to-day jobs in your life and rental property fill you with dread? Perhaps now is the time to think about paying for your local letting agent to take over the rental property management chores – such as cleaning, small repairs, and decorating – that use up your precious hours each month.
Why not reduce your stress and buy more time – and concentrate on the parts of letting you really need to do and outsource the areas you really don’t. The chores and ‘boring jobs’ might be causing you extra stress that you can really do without!
If you need help achieving a more managed service for your rental property, just give us a call – we’ll give you some more free time and take away some of the stress!
