When I set out to invest in Tbilisi, I had three requirements to set up my home base:
- I would have the obligation to stay in Georgia (at least not for more than a month per year)
- All my investments are managed hands-off
My research concluded that the first requirement was doable. The second, though, was a challenge.
Real estate is quite different from other investments. They are tangible, you can, and often have to, touch them.
Things can break, and they will.
In short: I needed someone to take take care of my investments.
How to find a property manager
I had three approaches:
Find a local agency.
I haven not tried too much here, but I found one offer of a company that rents out the properties via airbnb and charges 15% of the gross rent. At that time that sounded reasonable to me. (If you want the reference, I can try to dig it out from my whatsapp list. Please email me in case!)
Hire on upwork
upwork.com is a hiring platform where you can post a job offer for any skills and language. I posted “help me buy real estate” and required Georgian language.
That was a great idea, but the results were mixed.
I set out to find someone who helps me in the whole process, and I met three people. One if the lawyer you will see in our references list. The other a girl who was totally incapable of understanding my needs. And the third was another woman who was nice at first, but then tried to sneak an apartment into our list where she’d get a kickback from. I don’t need to add that I haven’t engaged further here.
Local networking
Through friends of friends I found Zarina. She is the one who will continue this article. I wanted to write the introduction so you see the things that I have tried.
As Zarina will continue writing about how our collaboration works, you will see that you might also benefit from her.
I just want to make this clear: we are not a real estate company, and I don’t benefit financially from this post. But I would benefit from more activity on this website. If you want to read about the intentions, read the about section.
Just to round this up: meeting someone like Zarina is definitely something you can also do when you are here. Georgians are great people and have many traits of other Europeans. I found a lot of help in the months I stayed here and I am sure that you will find what you need as well. Take time and network. Maybe the tips for networking in Tbilisi might also help.
Now, I hand this post over to Zarina. Take it away!
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