How to Create the Perfect Welcome Package for Your Houston Tenants

April 13, 2021 by Luis Rojo

How to Create the Perfect Welcome Package for Your Houston Tenants

Maintaining a strong relationship with your tenants will play a crucial role in your success as a landlord. Though there are plenty of ways to strengthen and keep your tenant relationships throughout the course of a lease, you can start building a good relationship by gifting your tenants with a welcome package.

Providing a welcome package tells your tenants you care about them, and you want them to feel comfortable in their new home. Here are some ideas for crafting the perfect welcome package for your Houston renters.

Include items tenants will find helpful under the stress of moving

Your new tenants will probably be exhausted or burned-out from packing, moving, and rearranging their belongings inside their new home. Add the following four items to your welcome package and you’ll make their first few days a little easier.

1. A gift card for a nearby restaurant

Your tenants probably won’t be avid to cook a good meal after expending so much physical energy on the move. Sure, they could drive through the nearest fast-food business, but that’s not the healthiest option.

Get a gift card for your tenants to spend at a local restaurant so they can relax in a calm environment and enjoy somebody else doing the cooking.

2. Place toilet paper in every bathroom

Never underestimate the power of leaving every bathroom stocked with toilet paper. Your tenants will be tired from moving and they might not remember where they packed their rolls. They won’t want to go to the store, either, if they aren’t already too late to find one open.

3. Put soap in the bathrooms, and dish detergent and a sponge in the kitchen

As with toilet paper, your new tenants might not remember where they packed their cleaning supplies and hand soap. They might be buried in a box in the car, and demand too much effort to retrieve. Place some hand soap in each bathroom, and some dish detergent and a sponge in the kitchen.

To make sure all your tenants can use the hand soap, get unscented, natural soap that has almost no ingredients that could harm sensitive skin. Goat’s milk soap and honey hemp soap are fantastic options for hand soap. For dish detergent, go with a brand like Seventh Generation or another plant-based detergent.

4. Stash some garbage bags in the kitchen

Your tenants will love having quick access to garbage bags while they spend time sifting through their possessions and figuring out where to put them. If they order pizza or other take-out food, garbage bags will be very handy.

Include items that will make tenants feel appreciated

Most tenants likely have never received a welcome package, let alone a verbal “welcome to the neighborhood” from their landlord. Include these two items in your welcome package, and you’ll make your tenants feel appreciated.

1. A welcome card

Since most tenants are accustomed to landlords taking no active interest in their well-being, it shouldn’t take much to surprise and impress yours. Include a greeting card in your welcome package and let them know you’re pleased to have them join the community.

2. Tips on where to find food, entertainment, and travel

Every neighborhood has its own array of wonderful hole-in-the-wall restaurants, obscure entertainment venues, and public transit quirks.

Give your new tenants a printout of where they can find the best restaurants that serve a variety of foods. Maybe there’s a wonderful Thai restaurant nearby or a Mexican cantina with lines out the door (and you can tell them which hours they don’t!).

Public transit tips are also appreciated when things don’t go as expected. For example, if the bus system hasn’t updated its routes online, your tenants will appreciate being alerted.

Also, provide them with the phone number to call if they want to know whether the buses and trains are on time. Public transit information will be especially useful to your “Generation Y” tenants.

Finally, if there’s a way to save money when one rides the bus and light rail regularly, let your tenants know. In some regions, for instance, one may ride the light rail without paying extra if you already have a current day pass from the local transit system.

Also, express buses will sometimes give riders a discount if they trade in their day pass from another bus system. People who are new to the area won’t know about such things.

Include items that will make your tenants smile

Give your new tenants a reason to smile with these two gifts.

1. Candy and chocolate

Your new tenants will love a gift basket filled with goodies like chocolate, candy, or muffins. Most people enjoy having snacks on hand when they’ve been working hard all day.

Just make sure the ingredients are visible, and avoid foods that contain allergens like soy, wheat, and nuts. Some families will not have allergies, but you should avoid nuts to be safe. Certain people have peanut allergies that are so severe, they can’t even breathe when exposed to a peanut.

2. Chips and salsa

Chips and salsa make a great staple for late-night snacking. Chances are that the salsa jar won’t even make it back to the fridge on the first night.

Include items that will protect your investment property

Your tenants probably know they mustn’t punch holes in the walls. However, sometimes a renter will forget and mount large items without thinking. You might enclose the following items in a gift packet to help them decorate their new home without leaving marks.

1. Easy on/off adhesive hooks for the wall

Several adhesive hooks on the market can hold hundreds of pounds. The design is clever: The hook base adheres to the wall and the actual hook slides in.

When you want to remove the hook, there’s a tab you can pull that makes the adhesive stretch until it peels off completely clean.

2. Museum putty

Museum putty will come in handy for fastening objects to a shelf or a wall without the need to drill a hole.

Making your tenants feel welcome takes minimal effort

When your tenants feel appreciated from the start of the relationship, they’ll be easier to work with. They’ll be more likely to regard mistakes or oversights with a light heart rather than malice.

It doesn’t take much to make people feel welcome in their new Houston home. Think about what you’d like to have if you were moving into a new place and make that a reality for your tenants. They’ll appreciate everything you do to make their move-in experience a breeze.

Too busy to create a welcome package? We can help

At Green Residential, we understand the importance of making new tenants feel welcome. However, creating a welcome package takes time and effort you may not be able to spare as a landlord.

Partner with us as your property management team and we’ll take care of your landlord duties while you create a welcoming experience for your new tenants.

We’ll handle everything from rent collection to tenant screening and all the details in between. Connect with us today to learn more about how we can make your life easier.

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