Remote management - internationally
Hello, I currently live in California and have been successfully managing my multiple properties in the Frisco (Texas) area for the last 3 years. I plan to move back to India soon and was wondering if at all it would be possible to remotely manage my properties from India (12 hour time difference makes real time communication a lot harder). I would prefer to self manage to avoid the high poperty management fees (I think its around 10% + 1 month leasing fee, etc.) and I also worry that the property manager will likely not be as dilligent in finding high quality affordable vendors, etc.
I see 4 major pieces of work
1) Tenant finding: I feel comfortable doing this remotely. I list on Zillow, primarily communicate with them over Zillow messages and then give our remote login code to enter the home.
2) Maintenance between tenants - This one will be tricky as I will have to transfer all utilities to my name and send multiple vendors to the house for getting the house rent ready. Both of this will likely require real time conversations which will be difficult from India
3) Maintenance when tenants are staying - I feel less worried about this as I can have the tenant coordinate with my chosen vendor (that I already have or can potentially find from India by talking to them on phone at night time in India / morning in the US). I can pre-authorize an amount and if the expense is below that, the vendor can do the repairs without talking to me live
4) Urgent maintenance issues - say a pipe breaks, or tenant is locked out. I am not sure how to handle this - can I give them contacts of a plumber and say a locksmith and have them reach out to them and address the urgent issue. I will later reimburse the tenant?
Am I thinking about this the right way? Am i missing anything big? Has anyone self-managed their properties from an international location that would be willing to share their learnings with me?
If I do go the property management route - can i get a limited service option (say in which I find the tenant, collect rent, handle most maitnenance issues) and they primarily are liasoning with my vendors during US business hours and handle any urgent maintenance issues?
Thank you for all your suggestions - I have learned a lot from this forum and all the advice has been invaluable in me having the confidence to remotely buy and self manage my properties thus far.