Homeowner Welcome Guide

We are excited to be your trusted partner! We crafted this guide to outline next steps and help you understand what to expect throughout your Bungalow journey.

Meet Our Homeowner Account Management Team

Your account manager is your primary point of contact dedicated to your experience at Bungalow. They can assist with any pressing concerns you may have about the process, your property, or the market.

You may also hear from account specialists who assist with quick questions or immediate concerns. We made every effort to share everything you’ll need to know in this guide. If you can’t find an answer here, please don’t hesitate to email any questions to accounts@bungalow.com, where your account manager can respond in a timely manner during our designated business hours (Mon-Fri: 9AM-5PM MST).

Homeowner Orientation

Your account manager is responsible for reaching out to you directly to schedule the Homeowner Orientation Call. During the call, the goal is to recap your lease agreement, walk you through the home inspection process, provide instructions for payment setup on our portal, and answer anything else you would like to discuss.

Onboarding

To successfully get your home Bungalow-ready, we need a few items from you. Reference our Onboarding Checklist chart below for full details.

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Failure to complete homeowner action items prior to the lease start date can result in delayed onboarding.

Additionally, we cannot onboard your home and start the lease until you have full access and ownership of the home. It cannot be in escrow or under construction.  If the home requires any city inspections, rent control certificates, or other city, county, or state issued licenses you will also need to obtain those before we can onboard your home.

Onboarding checklist
Your action items
Bungalow’s action items
Complete the form at least two days before your lease starts.
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Pro tip
Submitting your utility bills through the Property Information Form helps us transfer utilities much faster!
If you decide to do it yourself please refer to the inspection guide and deep clean guide.
Complete Form
1
Repair &
Deep Clean
2
Property Access
3
Place lockbox on site and include all keys and/or remote for each access point and each resident.
Home Services
4
Water/Gas/Power
Garbage and Bins
Furnishings and Wifi
Landscaping
Bungalow will procure each utility that we’re contractually responsible for (est. completion up to 2 weeks).
Keep utilities active upon signing the lease to avoid any onboarding delays.
Order garbage bins if you hold and pay for garbage in the lease agreement.
Remove items that were not approved or request a quote from our team
You’re responsible for landscaping unless you use Bungalow as a vendor.
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If you’re interested in using Bungalow as a vendor, request a quote from our team.
We will order bins if we hold and pay for garbage in the lease agreement.
We will work with our vendor to deliver furniture and install wi-fi.
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Info
*co-living homes only (est. 1 day)
Utilities

Your utility bills have all the information we need for a seamless transfer. Providing us with a copy of each one helps speed up the process.

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Provide a copy of each utility bill to your account manager.

In the event that we are unable to procure a specific utility and the utility needs to remain in your name, we will send you an addendum to reallocate utility responsibility. Many factors can deter us from procuring a utility, including but not limited to:

  •  utility is not sub-metered
  •  utility is covered via HOA / property taxes
  •  local laws / municipality regulations do not allow it

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Be sure to inform your account manager if any of the above mentioned factors applies to your circumstance.

When local laws /municipality regulations prevent us from putting a specific utility in our name, homeowners can instead put the utility "in the care of Bungalow". This allows you to hold the bill as the owner of the property, while granting us visibility and access to make payments.

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Even when you put utilities in the care of Bungalow, you may continue to receive bills from the utility companies. We don’t have control over these correspondences.
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To place utilities "in the care of Bungalow", follow this simple 2-step process (This only pertains to a select few cities / counties across the U.S. Ask us if you’re not sure whether your city/county is impacted.)

  •  Call your utility provider and request that they put the utility "in the care of Bungalow"
  •  Inform your account manager at Bungalow so we can activate the utility on our end

Payment

To ensure secure and timely payments,  you’ll want to set up and enable Stripe as your preferred payment method within our portal. If you do not enable Stripe payments, we will mail a physical check to the mailing address provided on your lease agreement. If your mailing address changes, it is your responsibility to notify your account manager. Please note the timeliness of mailed checks may vary based on shipping schedules.

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Even when you put utilities in the care of Bungalow, you may continue to receive bills from the utility companies. We don’t have control over these correspondences.

Ledger Information

No one likes a ledger full of surprises. Below, we outlined some of the most common fees you might see on your monthly ledger and their definitions.

Fee Type
Lease Agreement
Description
Onboarding Fee
Section 9
“House Preparation”
We charge this fee to get your home move-in ready. It includes SmartLock installations and may also include furnishings if relevant. Please note repairs are not included in this fee.
Onboarding
Repair Billbacks
*Not referenced in Lease Agreement
In this Guide
“Onboarding”
A property walkthrough is conducted to confirm your property’s marketability, pricing, and condition. Results will be shared with you as well as a list of any items needing attention or repairs.
Tenant
Placement Fee
Section 7
“Lease Up Fee””
Also called 'Lease Up Fee' the fee is calculated as a percentage of the base rent, and is charged each time a new resident moves in.
Renewal Fee
Section 8
“Renewal Fee”
The fee is calculated as a percentage of the base rent, and is charged each time an existing resident renews a sublease. The percentage may vary depending on the renewal length.
Maintenance Billbacks
Section 10
“Bungalow Maintenance Management Services”
We only bill you for maintenance charges that fall outside of resident responsibility.

Homeowner Portal

Want a pulse check on your home’s performance? We designed the homeowner portal so you can easily view everything in one place: current and historical payments, incurred maintenance expenses, occupancy details, and more.

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Sign into the portal with the same email address used for payment setup. Log out of your other google accounts to avoid an error.
Utilities
Overview
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This tab displays a quick glance at the numbers for the month.
You'll find:
  •  Total amount of rent expected
  •  Total maintenance expenses incurred
  •  Expected date of your next payment

Your Homes
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Navigate to this tab for an overview of marketing efforts and your property’s performance.
You’ll find:
  •  Total amount of rent expected
  •  Total maintenance expenses incurred
  •  Expected date of your next payment

Payments
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This tab displays current and historical payments, and how they’re calculated. You’ll find:
  •  Payments are issued no later than 6 days after the last day of the month
  •  Green numbers = total payment for the month as the sum calculation of cash inflow and outflow
  •  Grey arrows pointing upward = cash inflow
  •  Pink arrows pointing downward = cash outflow

Performance
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Click this tab for a deeper dive into your property’s real-time data and metrics. You’ll find:
  •  Occupancy
Total payment for the month as the sum calculation of cash inflow and outflow
  •  Room Price
The listings price / value over time
  •  Marketing Metrics
Number of visits to your property from our website
  •  Rental Revenue
Rental revenue over time with details

Quality Maintenance

Coordinating maintenance and repairs with tenants and contractors can be challenging, but Bungalow is here to help. In addition to rendering the actual repair services, our in-house team of experienced coordinators and local technicians also handles dispatching, scheduling, and billing for all maintenance requests. For anything outside of general handy work (i.e . HVAC, Pest Control, Electricians), we leverage external vendor specialists.

We only bill you for maintenance charges that fall outside of resident responsibility and general wear-and-tear repairs. Our maintenance costs are relatively cheaper than external vendors across all categories.

After maintenance requests are resolved, we promptly survey tenants on their experience to ensure our residential satisfaction scores are consistently improving over time.

How It Works

Addressing maintenance requests made by Bungalow tenants in a timely manner has a huge impact on their overall rental experience and satisfaction. Happy tenants stay longer and take better care of your property.
In order to address maintenance requests quickly and efficiently while ensuring a great resident experience, our policy allows us to automatically deploy our technicians to inspect and fix necessary repairs while incurring maintenance costs up to your “per incident cap” or “annual cap” in any one calendar year.

Anything under those thresholds, Bungalow handles directly, and bills you back at competitive rates:
$150 for the first hour, and $60/hr after.

Maintenance costs exceeding your “per incident cap” or “annual cap” require your consent and approval. Upon receiving a maintenance cost approval request from the Bungalow team, you are expected to respond within 24 hours. Failure to respond within 24 hours is the equivalent of providing consent, and Bungalow shall move forward with the repairs.

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If a resident is found responsible for necessary repair(s),  you will not be charged.

Bungalow Policies

Lease start
We cannot onboard your home and start the lease until you have full access and ownership of the home. It cannot be in escrow or under construction. Also If the home requires any city inspections, rent control certificates, or other city, county, or state issued licenses, you will also need to obtain those before we can onboard your home.

Payment schedule
Every month, we send payments no later than 6 business days after the last day of the month. Refer to section 3 “Rent” in your lease agreement for more details.

Early termination and transfer for residents
Early terminations and transfers are rare. In the event that your home is impacted, we offer concessions. Concessions are applied on the same cadence as revenue share. An eligible early termination occurs when a resident submits notice for any of the following:

How It Works

Addressing maintenance requests made by Bungalow tenants in a timely manner has a huge impact on their overall rental experience and satisfaction. Happy tenants stay longer and take better care of your property.
In order to address maintenance requests quickly and efficiently while ensuring a great resident experience, our policy allows us to automatically deploy our technicians to inspect and fix necessary repairs while incurring maintenance costs up to your “per incident cap” or “annual cap” in any one calendar year.

Anything under those thresholds, Bungalow handles directly, and bills you back at competitive rates:
$150 for the first hour, and $60/hr after.

Maintenance costs exceeding your “per incident cap” or “annual cap” require your consent and approval. Upon receiving a maintenance cost approval request from the Bungalow team, you are expected to respond within 24 hours. Failure to respond within 24 hours is the equivalent of providing consent, and Bungalow shall move forward with the repairs.

  •  Early termination
  •  Abandonment (without continued billing)
  •  Eviction
  •  Mutual termination
  •  Love Where You Live Trial termination

Additionally, in order for a transfer to be considered eligible, the resident must transfer to another home that is not owned by the same homeowner as their current home.
For each valid early termination or transfer, a concession period is calculated (typically 30-45 days of rent). The concession begins the day after the resident moves out of their current room, and ends when 1 of the below conditions is met, whichever comes first:

  •  45 days after the concession began (or 30 days in the case of a Love Where You Live Trial termination)
  •  The current resident’s lease end date (as stated previously, concessions are not given beyond the resident’s contractual lease end date)
  •  The date the room is filled with a new resident
  •  The date notice is submitted to offboard the property or changes to a fixed-cost lease

Residents/Subtenants Outreach
We ask that you DO NOT contact residents directly. This can cause gaps in communication, confusion, and delays in issues being properly addressed in an efficient manner. If a resident reaches out to you directly, please redirect the communication to our team, so we can promptly address their issue.

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Please do not respond to residents directly.
Forward all communication to
accounts@bungalow.com

Maintenance approval
When an expected maintenance charge exceeds your “per incident cap” and “annual cap”, we will reach out to you directly for approval. To ensure habitability of the house for subtenants, you’re required to respond within 24 hours.

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Maintenance requests require a response within 24 hours.

Home entry
If you or your agent needs to enter home, you’re required to give no less than a 72-hour notice to allow Bungalow to inform subtenants. This notice can only be circumvented in the case of an emergency.

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72-hour notice required to enter the home.

Renewal
Your account manager will reach out to you 1-2 months prior to the end of your lease.

Additional resources

Please do not hesitate to reach out to us with any questions along the way. For the quickest response time, email your account manager at accounts@bungalow.com

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