The Second Generation Problem

Family rental portfolios often stumble at handover because the knowledge that ran them was never written down. The person who built them knew which tenant paid late and why, which deposit sat in which interest bearing account, and that the municipal account for the back cottage was still in a dead relative's name. None of it needed writing down while that person was alive and answering the phone.

When the estate is opened, the heirs inherit the buildings without the memory. They find leases that ran out years ago and simply carried on, tenants who say they paid deposits nobody can trace, and a title deed in a drawer that may not match the municipal records. The executor has to sort all of it out before the properties can pass to the heirs, and meanwhile tenants learn quickly that nobody is checking. The remedy is unexciting: written leases, a record of every deposit and where it is held, municipal accounts in the right names, and one folder that a stranger could open and follow. A portfolio that only makes sense inside its owner's head is worth less than its buildings, and the family pays the difference, usually in the year it can least afford to.