Effective ways of professionals to negotiate when renting house in Hanoi
When you have selected a preferred house to rent, the landlord might put the listed price as the only one. Nevertheless, if you are really interested in a property, you still can give it a try to negotiate and end up getting a good deal.
The below tricks can help you become more confident in the negotiation.
1. Make sure you know the pros and cons of the apartment for rent
Having a detailed and clear understanding about the apartment you desire to rent and its complex will definitely give you a good chance to win. The corridor is quite narrow, the building is next to a noisy construction site or no washing machine is equipped, are all the cons you can leverage to ask for a discount.
Besides, don’t skip the chance to talk to other nearby landlords and neighbor. Consider this as a small research to compare average price range in the area and what amenities other landlords offer so that you can come up with a fair rate for your ideal apartment. Meanwhile, some next doors can even give you review about the living condition like security, building management, traffic, etc. which can become persuasive evidences for your bargain.
2. Offer to sign a longer contract
In fact, no landlord wants to leave their apartment vacant due to 2 main reasons. Firstly, even that is an empty unit, they still have to bear some costs. Taxes and management fees are still monthly or quarterly paid even though no one lives in the apartment. Moreover, some appliances like fridge or air-conditioner should be kept running in a period of time to ensure good maintenance. Thus, the expenses still emerge even when the rent pauses. Secondly, once a tenant moves out, the landlord needs to start a new cycle of posting rental advertisement, sparing time on showing apartment to customers and agents, proceeding some troublesome legal paperwork, amending features before the new comer moves in. These steps take them not only time but also money that nobody wants to do often. Sometimes, the potential tenant even changes his mind after all above procedures completed. Therefore, offering a long lease, in 2 – 3 years and propose some percents off on monthly rental will work in this case. Don’t be shy to tell the host that you are fond of this apartment and do not have intention to relocate in the next years, which will result in better profits for them.
3. Propose to do some maintenance and repairs on your own
Repairing simple breakdowns may not matter to some people, especially to men, which you can ask in exchange for a lower rental. For example, replacing light bulb, tightening up faucet or covering leaked dish washing tank is not difficult to handle by yourself. So, you can do it instead of calling mechanic or landlord which will take time and cost. Or sometimes dry function of washing machine does not work anymore, but you can accept as it is, and are willing to buy a new clothes-dryer to use in the winter. But remember that all the previous damages should be taken picture and listed down in the contract appendix if you don’t want to be charged when you leave.
4. Offer to pay a few months’ rent or the full lease
This option will depend on your financial status but surely can result in a better price. Since prepaying some months of rent at once can demonstrate your stability to the landlord and prevent them from being worry about late payment every month. On the other hand, you are also secure in the case that your landlord wants to increase price suddenly because of any reasons. Thus, if you can afford to do it, be generous to pay 3 or 6 months in advance (or even full rent) in order to ask the landlord to lower monthly lease.
Actually when being in a negotiation with the landlord, you should be open and flexible to achieve a win-win result. Once you show them your commitment to rent, most of landlords will make concessions because they don’t like their unit being left empty.
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