MGS Development: setting up a property you have never visited

The keys are handed over and the property does nothing until a series of practical steps is completed. For an owner abroad each one requires a person here, and the gap between handover and first rent is where returns quietly leak away.

The list, in order

• Title registration completed and the deed in hand.
• Electricity and water connection, which needs the deed, identification and a deposit, and must be in the owner's name before a tenant can take it over.
• Cooling account, where the building uses a district cooling provider — a separate account with its own deposit and its own capacity charge that starts running whether or not anyone lives there.
• Gas and internet, where applicable.
• Owners' association registration, so service-charge invoices reach you rather than accumulating unseen.
• Snagging and defect rectification, completed before a tenant moves in rather than during.
• Any furnishing or fit-out, which needs the association's approval and an approved contractor in most buildings.
• Photographs and an inventory for the letting listing and for the eventual handover to a tenant.
• The tenancy, once let, registered in the prescribed system.

Where the money leaks

• Empty months are not free. Service charge, cooling capacity charge and utility standing charges all run from handover, whether or not there is a tenant.
• A slow start compounds. Three months to get connected and listed is three months of costs against no income, and it is entirely avoidable.
• Unaddressed service-charge invoices become arrears, and arrears block the certificate you will need to sell.

Who does it

• A managing agent handles all of the above for a percentage of rent, and for an overseas owner this is usually the right answer rather than an optional extra.
• Appoint them separately from the sale. The company that sold you the unit is not automatically the right one to manage it, and combining the two reduces your leverage on both.
• A limited power of attorney may be needed for utility accounts and registrations. Keep it narrow and time-limited, and revoke it when the engagement ends.
• Agree the scope in writing: what is included, what is charged extra, what spending limit they have without asking you, and how often you get reported to.

What to check before you are in this position

• Deposits required for utilities and cooling, so they are budgeted.
• The building's cooling arrangement and the annual capacity charge.
• Whether the district is far enough along to let at all — on a new island, amenity arrives with residents, and a finished apartment in an empty district lets slowly.

Requirements and deposits change. Confirm current procedures with the utility providers and the building's management.