How to Rent Out My House: The First-Time Landlord's Guide

Deciding to rent out your house for the first time can be both thrilling and nerve-racking. Is it worth it in the long run? Should you sell instead? How much work is it going to take? And the big one: how do I rent out my house without making an expensive mistake in month one?

This is the guide we wish every first-time landlord had. Below you'll find a first-time landlord checklist you can work straight through, the legal and financial basics you need to know before you list, and honest answers on when to do it yourself and when to hand it off. Most steps link to a deeper walkthrough, so you can go as far into the weeds as you want.

Nomad offers property management software owners use to lease and manage their own homes, with guaranteed rent behind it. It was also founded by experienced landlords with both property-management and self-managing backgrounds. So the advice here comes from watching a lot of first leases go well — and a few go sideways.

First-Time Landlord Checklist

If you only read one section, read this one. Here's the short version of renting out a house for the first time, in the order things actually need to happen. Work down it and you'll cover everything a first time landlord is expected to know before handing over keys.

Before you list your home

☐ Confirm you're legally allowed to rent (check your HOA rules, mortgage terms, and any local licensing or rental registration requirements)

☐  Read up on fair housing and your state and local landlord-tenant laws

☐ Line up landlord insurance — not homeowners insurance

☐ Decide short-term vs. long-term rental

☐ Decide how it gets managed: on your own, with software like Nomad, or with a full-service local property manager

☐ Prep the property — repairs, deep clean, smoke and CO detectors, HVAC service

☐ Set your price using real local comps

☐ Pick your listing date strategically

Getting it leased

☐ Take high-quality photos

☐ Write a listing and syndicate it widely

☐ Set up a system for inquiries and showings before the leads start coming

☐ Write down your screening criteria and publish them

☐ Screen every applicant consistently

☐ Prepare a state-specific lease agreement

☐ Sign the lease and collect the security deposit and first month's rent

Move-in and beyond

☐ Transfer the utilities into the tenant's name

☐ Change the locks

☐ Do a documented move-in inspection with photos

☐ Start collecting rent — and enforce the late fees in your lease

☐ Keep up preventative maintenance

☐ Stay responsive to your tenant

If you don't live nearby

Read up on out-of-state landlord logistics — showings, maintenance, and registered agent requirements all get more complicated

Before the steps themselves, two things worth having in your head: what "normal" looks like, and whether renting is the right call at all.

What's Normal: Rental Benchmarks for First-Time Landlords

If you've never rented out a house before, you have no baseline for what "normal" looks like. Here's what Nomad's leasing data shows.

How renters behave — the part that holds steady year to year:

• Tenant interest peaks in the first 7 to 14 days on the market. After that, momentum works against you.

• Homes that lease within 7 days typically draw more than 20 inquiries in their first week. Homes that end up taking 30 or more days usually see fewer than half that in the same window.

• Price at your local market average and you can generally expect to lease in about your local market's average days on market. Price above it and you're buying vacancy.

What the market looked like most recently — the part that moves:

• As of November 2025, across the 67 markets Nomad tracks, average rent was $1,883 (median $1,835) and average days on market — the number of days between listing a rental and signing a lease — was 60 days.

• That national average hides enormous local variation. In the same month, Cheyenne averaged 29 days on market while Boston averaged 147. San Francisco led on rent at $3,650; the North Dakota markets Nomad tracks trailed at $1,100.

Behavioral figures come from Nomad's analysis of its own listings (July 2025). Market figures reflect Nomad's November 2025 market tracking across 67 U.S. markets.

Should You Rent Out Your House? The Pros and Cons

Before deciding how, it's worth determining whether it's worth renting to begin with. Here are the real tradeoffs of renting out your first home.

A note before the tax section: we're not qualified to give tax advice, and we recommend you always work with a qualified tax professional.

Pros

Tax benefits. If you've lived in your home for at least two of the last five years, you may still qualify for the capital gains exclusion when you sell, even after renting it out for a stretch. That means the house can appreciate while someone else pays down the mortgage. Two caveats worth knowing before you count on it: the depreciation you claim while the home is rented gets recaptured and taxed when you sell, whether or not the exclusion applies, and gains above the exclusion cap are taxable too. It's worth mapping the timing out with a CPA, because that window closes. That's the tax picture when you sell. While the home is rented, the everyday costs of running it (mortgage interest, property taxes, insurance, repairs, and depreciation) are deductible against your rental income, and our guide to rental property tax deductions walks through each one.

Recurring revenue. Two things happen every month a tenant is in place. Rent that exceeds your mortgage, taxes, insurance, and maintenance is cash in your pocket now. Even in the months it doesn't, a chunk of that payment is going to principal rather than interest, so your equity grows on someone else's dime. Once the mortgage is paid off, the whole payment converts to income, and it keeps coming.

Appreciation. Your home is likely becoming more valuable the longer you own it. Even if you do decide to sell at some point, there's a very good chance it'll be worth more in 10 or 15 years than it's worth today.

Cons

It requires work. It's true — renting out a property takes more work than a one-and-done sale. That said, this is the part that's most solvable. Most of the hours go into repeatable tasks, and software like Nomad takes those off your plate, so being a landlord doesn't have to become a second job.

Risk. Holding onto a property involves a bit more risk. What happens if a tenant trashes the place, or it sits vacant for months? Those are real concerns. They're also the specific things a rent guarantee exists to absorb.

If you've decided renting your property is right for you — congratulations. You're well on your way toward financial freedom. And now there's so much to do and so little time. Where should you list? At what price? How long should the lease be? Should you get a property manager? What happens if tenants trash the place?

Phew. Let's slow down a bit and go step-by-step.

How to Rent Out Your House, Step by Step

Step 1: Understand the Legal Side of Being a Landlord

First, the law. This is the least fun part of becoming a first-time landlord and the most expensive one to get wrong.

As a landlord, there are certain legal dos and don'ts you need to remember. Under the federal Fair Housing Act, you can't discriminate against tenants based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, familial status, or disability, and many states and cities add protected classes on top of that, like source of income or age. You also need to make sure your rental is safe and habitable. If something happens to your tenants due to negligence or a safety hazard, you'll be liable.

You'll also need to brush up on your local, state, and federal housing laws to learn the rules around rent increases, notice periods, assistance animals, evictions, and more.

Honor your contract. You hope and expect your tenants to do the same, so set the precedent. If your lease states the unit will be vacant and available on a specific date, make sure it is. Missing that date can create real legal exposure.

Know the rules on rent. It's your property, but you can't set rates in a vacuum. Some states and cities have rent control or rent stabilization, and a growing number cap how much you can raise rent year over year and how much notice you have to give. And you can't take matters into your own hands with a tenant who stops paying, you'll need a proper eviction process before you change locks or touch anyone's belongings. While rare, in the event of eviction for non-payment, Nomad can help make sure you have the right tools and expertise throughout the process, and reimburse up to $5,000 of legal-related eviction fees.

Then there are the nitty-gritty rules: how much you can charge for a security deposit, how quickly you have to return it, how much notice you owe before entering the property. It's a lot, and it varies by ZIP code.

If you build your lease with Nomad, you'll have a lease that is built with market legal experts. You can tailor the document to meet your needs, whether that's including a pet policy, leasing extensions, or other clauses. That way you don't have to worry about depending on an outdated template you found online for an important legal document.

Step 2: Get the Right Insurance

Sort your insurance before you list, not after you've picked a tenant. Your homeowners policy likely won't cover a property you rent out — once there's a tenant in place you generally need a landlord policy (often called a dwelling or DP-3 policy), which covers the structure, liability, and in many cases lost rental income. Renting without switching is one of the most consequential first-time landlord mistakes, because you usually only find out at claim time.

Related reading: Why you desperately need a complete property protection plan

Also worth knowing: insurance covers catastrophe, not the everyday gaps — a tenant who stops paying, damage beyond the deposit, a month of vacancy between leases. Property Protection and Guaranteed Rent are built for those, and it's worth understanding which risks sit with your insurer and which don't.

Step 3: Decide Between a Short-Term and Long-Term Rental

Do you want to rent your property on a short-term basis or on long-term leases?

Short-term and vacation rentals (through services like Airbnb or VRBO) can earn more per night, but they require far more hands-on work and carry higher management, cleaning, and furnishing costs. They're also the most likely to be restricted by local ordinances, so check your city's rules first.

Long-term rentals provide reliable, consistent income. You might not squeeze out every possible dollar, but they're typically much easier to manage, they save you hours every month, and management expenses are usually far lower.

There's no universally right answer. You'll need to decide which strategy fits your financial goals and your appetite for day-to-day involvement.

Step 4: Decide How Hands-On You Want to Be

This is the fork in the road, and there's no single right answer — it depends on how much of your own time you want in this. There are three legitimate paths.

Fully on your own. Many first-time landlords start here to keep every dollar on the table, and with one nearby property and some spare time, it's very doable. Then things get real pretty quick. Marketing the property, fielding inquiries, screening applicants, drafting a compliant lease, collecting rent, staying ahead of maintenance, eating vacancy costs — it adds up fast, and most of it is work you'll redo at every turnover.

A full-service local property manager. If you want to be genuinely hands-off — someone else taking the 9 p.m. maintenance call, walking the property, meeting the plumber, knowing which inspector to call in your city — a good local property manager earns their fee. That local presence and judgment is real, and it's especially valuable if you own several doors, live far away, or simply don't want the mental load. The tradeoff is cost, typically 10% or more of rent plus leasing fees. It's also worth knowing that a manager's incentive is to get your home occupied, which isn't always identical to getting you the highest rent — a good manager will talk openly with you about that, and it's a fair question to ask when you're interviewing them.

Software-assisted self-management, like Nomad. This is the middle path, and it's the one Nomad was built for: you keep the decisions, the software does the repetitive work. You set the rent and pick your tenant from screened applicants; the platform handles syndicating your listing across 30+ sites, running screening, generating a state-specific lease, collecting rent, and triaging maintenance requests to a vetted local vendor network. You keep final say on what gets done and what gets spent. It runs around 4% of rent instead of 10%+, and it comes with guaranteed rent — an arrangement where you're paid a set amount on a set date whether or not the home is currently occupied.

In Nomad's own market data, homes listed through the platform have leased meaningfully faster than surrounding market averages — largely because pricing, syndication breadth, and inquiry response are the three levers that move days on market, and all three are handled by default.

Being a landlord doesn't have to mean choosing between doing everything and handing over the keys entirely.

The rest of this guide walks through the full process. It's worth reading no matter which path you pick — with Nomad you're still the one making these calls, just with the busywork handled.

Step 5: Price the Property

Nailing your rental rate is the highest-stakes decision you'll make, and the one first-time landlords most often get wrong in both directions. There's a lot to weigh:

• City, county, and state location

• Size of your property

• Included amenities

• Target market

• Seasonal demand

• Economic conditions

• Local trends

• Supply and demand

• Comparable rental rates in your immediate area

• The minimum income you need to cover the mortgage and expenses

Overprice it and you pay for the mistake in vacancy. Underprice it and you're locked in below market for a full lease term. Both are expensive, and when you're renting out a house for the first time it's genuinely hard to tell which one you're doing. Price above your local market average and you're buying vacancy; the only question is how many weeks.

The upside is that a mispriced listing is fixable fast if you're watching. In one Denver home Nomad tracked, the market average for that property type was 41 days on market. The owner watched the response for five days, made a single meaningful price cut rather than a drip of small ones, and signed a lease on day 9. Nomad's listing data also shows inquiries spiking within 48 hours of a price reduction — so you'll know within two days whether your new number is working.

Go deeper: What's the best price strategy for your rental property? walks through pulling real comps and pressure-testing your number.

Related reading: Lease your rental faster by leveraging local time-to-lease data

Step 6: Get the Property Rent-Ready

A property that shows well rents faster and at a higher price. Before photos, handle the repairs, the deep clean, and the safety basics: working smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, functioning locks on every exterior door, serviced HVAC, and clear gutters.

Should you furnish it? Nomad compared furnished and unfurnished long-term rentals across its own listings in 2025 and found a real tradeoff rather than a clear winner. Furnished homes leased at 108% of Nomad's internal rent estimate, versus 103% for unfurnished — a premium worth roughly $125 a month on a $2,500 rental. But they leased more slowly and to a much thinner pool: furnished listings drew an average of 14 inquiries before leasing, unfurnished drew 30. Only 12% of furnished homes leased within 30 days, versus 32% of unfurnished ones, and average days on market ran 34 furnished against 27 unfurnished.

For a first-time landlord, that usually points unfurnished: you trade a modest monthly premium for a faster lease, more applicants to choose from, and no furniture to insure, repair, or inventory at move-out.

If you're listing into cold weather, there's an extra layer — frozen pipes during a vacancy are one of the most expensive things that can happen to an empty house.

Nomad's internal rent estimate is the rent its pricing model projects for a home before it lists — so leasing at 108% of estimate means the home rented 8% above that projection. Figures from Nomad's 2025 analysis of its own listings.

Step 7: Time Your Listing

When you list matters nearly as much as what you list it for. Rental demand is seasonal in most markets, and the pattern is consistent enough to plan around: rents and new lease volume both peak in late spring, hold through the summer, soften after August, and bottom out in January and February. A home listed into the winter trough competes for a much smaller pool of renters, and the cost shows up twice — in weeks of extra vacancy and in the rent you settle for.

This is why your lease end date is a decision, not an accident. A 12-month lease signed in November expires in November, dropping your next turnover into the slowest stretch of the year — and then again the year after that, and the year after that. Signing a 14- or 16-month term once, to shift your expiration into late spring, can pay for itself several times over the life of the property.

Related reading: Lease date decisions that cost owners more than they realize

Step 8: Market and List the Property

Once you've set a price, it's time to market your rental. First, get high-quality, current photos and put them in the right order. If you have a good camera and some picture-taking know-how, you can handle the shoot yourself. If not, consider hiring a professional photographer; it pays for itself.

llustration. Nothing was repaired, repainted, or restaged between these two frames — only the blinds, the lights, where the photographer stood, and what got picked up off the floor.

Order matters more than first-time landlords expect. Nomad's listing data shows that listings using its recommended photo sequence (lead with the exterior, then the main living space, then kitchen, then bedrooms) have received up to 70% more inquiries than those that don't. Getting this right before you go live is very important, because Nomad's data also shows 17% of a listing's inquiries arrive in the first 24 hours and 58% in the first week. Early traffic isn't recoverable; a listing that goes up with the bathroom as the lead photo has already spent its best week. Nomad owners can book professional photography through HomeJab — premium HDR photos, video, and 3D tours, shot in all 50 states and delivered in 24 hours — for a $189 deposit that's refunded when you lease with Nomad.

Then write the description. You need to genuinely sell the property while being honest about what it delivers. It's better to be straightforward from the get-go than to correct expectations later. If your rental is in the suburbs on the outskirts of town, resist the urge to call it a downtown location. And if you can barely see the mountains from one bedroom window while standing on your tippy-toes, don't promise "a picturesque mountain view."

Find the real, specific details worth highlighting: the brand-new appliances, the walkable distance to the park, the gym, the grocery store, the neighborhood restaurant everyone likes.

Next, get it in front of people. You'll want to list on sites like Zillow, Apartments.com, Realtor.com, and Facebook Marketplace, which Nomad can help you do easily within minutes. Broad syndication is what separates a two-week lease-up from a two-month one.

Go deeper: Top 5 sites to advertise your rental

How Nomad handles this: Rental Advertising syndicates your listing to 30+ sites from one submission, which matters more than any single site does — breadth of distribution is one of the few levers that reliably moves days on market.

Step 9: Handle Inquiries and Showings

Here's the part first-time landlords underestimate: the moment your listing goes live, your phone starts going off. Response speed is one of the biggest levers on how fast a home leases — good renters are talking to several owners at once, and they move on the ones who reply first.

Nomad's analysis of its own listings — the pattern we call the leasing curve, meaning how inquiry volume in a listing's first week predicts how fast it will lease — shows how early this gets decided. Homes that lease within 7 days receive more than 20 inquiries in their first week on the market. Homes that end up taking 30 or more days typically see fewer than half that in the same window. Across the board, most leases are signed in a listing's first 7 to 14 days.

The practical read: your first week is diagnostic, not just a slow start. If inquiries are arriving but showings aren't converting, the problem is the home or the showing experience. If inquiries aren't arriving at all, the problem is the price or the listing — and waiting will not fix either one.

Decide in advance how you'll respond, what you'll say, and how you'll run showings safely and efficiently. Batching showings into blocks beats one-off appointments. And if you don't want to go the full DIY route, Nomad's team can help with Professional Tenant Placement, which covers coordinating tours to meeting qualified renters while you stay in the loop.

Related reading: Renter inquiry response templates for owners — steal these rather than writing replies from scratch at 10 p.m.

Step 10: Screen Tenants

Once applications start coming in, the screening begins. Screening tenants is a bit like hiring: if you only get a couple of applicants, you'll feel pressure to bend your criteria, which is exactly when writing them down in advance pays off.

Decide your criteria before you see a single application, so you're applying the same standard to everyone. That's both smart business and how you stay on the right side of fair housing law.

• What's your policy on pets?

• What's your policy on smoking?

• Will you run background checks?

• What rent-to-income ratio do you require?

• What will you ask references?

• What lease terms do you want, and are they negotiable?

Put these criteria in your listing to filter applicants from the start. It saves everyone time.

Then, with your prime candidates:

• Run background checks

• Check credit

• Contact references and verify income

• Interview the applicant

• Make a decision — and document why

When you lease through Nomad, the platform runs a 10-point screen — credit, criminal history, income and employment verification — on every applicant, and pair it with a lawyer-vetted lease you can sign digitally. You still choose the tenant; the platform just makes sure you're choosing with the full picture.

This is the step where a first-time landlord has the least to go on and the most at stake. A bad tenancy is the single most expensive outcome in this entire guide, and it isn't close: lost rent while someone stops paying, the legal cost of removing them, repairs beyond the deposit, and then the vacancy while you re-lease — stacked on top of each other, in that order. Consistency is what protects you: the same checks, in the same order, applied to every applicant.

Nomad's screening data shows credit is an imperfect but real signal here: applicants scoring below 650 carry an average rent loss rate of 1.57%, roughly eight times that of stronger applicants.

Related reading: Credit Scores: Imperfect, Yet Insightful for Landlords 

Step 11: Prepare the Lease Agreement

Don't shortcut the lease. Even if you've found an ideal tenant who checks every box, everything needs to be in writing. As mentioned above, leases built through Nomad are vetted by market legal experts and approved by counsel, and you're able to tailor the clauses to your specific needs.

Your lease should cover the rights and responsibilities of both parties, the rent amount and due date, late fees and penalties, maintenance responsibilities, property rules, the length of the term, and any required state and local disclosures. Lease requirements are state-specific, so a generic template is a real risk.

Step 12: Sign the Lease

A polished lease agreement without signatures isn't worth much. Make time to walk your new tenant through it, answer questions, make any agreed adjustments, and get it signed by every adult occupant.

Step 13: Collect the Security Deposit and First Month's Rent

Before you hand over keys to a new tenant, collect the security deposit and first month's rent per your lease. The deposit covers damage the tenant is responsible for and gives you a bit of cushion. Know your state's rules on deposit limits, where the funds must be held, and how quickly you have to return them — this is one of the most common sources of landlord-tenant disputes.

Go deeper: Security deposit laws by state — maximum deposits and return deadlines, state by state.

Step 14: Transfer the Utilities

Somebody has to own the light bill when you rent out a house. Before move-in, confirm which utilities transfer to the tenant, which stay in your name, and exactly when the switch happens — a gap here means either you're paying for a tenant's power or the water gets shut off on move-in day.

Related reading: How to transfer utilities to a new tenant (the right way)

Step 15: Begin Collecting Rent

Spell out the rent collection process in the lease. Whether that's an online payment platform, a check, or something else, make sure it's written down and understood. Online is worth it — it timestamps everything and creates a record you'll want if there's ever a dispute.

And don't become a people pleaser. If your tenant pays late, charge and collect the late fees in your lease. Skipping them signals that the due date is a suggestion.

Step 16: Maintain the Property

You and your tenant will both maintain the rental property, with different obligations. You won't be doing the weekly vacuuming — but you are responsible for keeping the water heater working, the gutters clear, and the HVAC serviced.

Remember: it's much cheaper to maintain than to replace. A little time now prevents a significant expense later.

Step 17: Maintain Tenant Relations

Keep an open line of communication. Make sure your tenants have a reliable way to reach you and respond quickly. You'd be frustrated if a tenant ignored your calls — set the example.

Good tenant relations are also retention. A tenant who renews saves you a turnover, and a turnover is the single most expensive event in a rental year.

What Happens When a Tenant Moves Out

When the lease is up, your tenant will likely have the option to renew or move on. If they renew — congratulations, that's much less work for you. Adjust the rate to reflect market conditions (within any legal limits), draw up a new lease, and keep things moving.

If they don't renew, you're back near square one. Depending on how long they lived there, you may need updated photos and a refreshed description. You'll re-list, re-market, and re-screen. And this time you'll know to line up the utilities transfer and the lease end date in advance.

You control every aspect of the process as a DIY landlord, but as you can see, it's a real job — and turnover is where the hours pile up. If you want to keep the control without redoing all of it by hand every couple of years, that's the gap software like Nomad fills.

Renting Out a House From Out of State

If you've moved and you're renting out the home you left, the whole playbook changes. Showings, maintenance calls, inspections, and emergency repairs all need someone local. Some states also require an in-state registered agent or property manager for non-resident owners.

Going With Nomad? Here's What's Next

If you've decided to lease your property with Nomad, enter your address to get your guaranteed rent estimate and start finding a tenant to enjoy your home.

You stay in control — you set the rent, you choose the tenant, you approve the repairs. The platform handles the listing syndication, the screening, the state-specific lease, and rent collection, and guaranteed rent means your payment lands on schedule regardless of what the month looked like.

Pay Off Your Mortgage, Then Do It Again

Know what's better than one property? Two properties. And what's better than two properties? Three.

Use your rental income to pay off your mortgage, then start the process over with a new home — if that's what you want to do.

Doing all of it by hand, the work compounds — every additional door is another set of listings, screenings, leases, and maintenance calls, and at some point you run out of evenings. The point of good software is that the second property doesn't cost you twice the time of the first. You find the homes; the platform handles the repetition.

First-Time Landlord FAQs

Is it worth renting out my house instead of selling?

Often yes, if you can absorb the risk — renting keeps you exposed to appreciation and generates monthly income while someone else pays down your mortgage. The honest caveats: it's an ongoing responsibility, and it's a real problem if you can't handle a few months of vacancy or a major repair. Your equity position and local rent-to-price ratio drive the math. If you've lived in the home recently, there's also a tax timing question worth running past a CPA before you decide.

How much should I charge to rent out my house?

Start with comparable rentals in your immediate area — same bedroom count, similar condition, within a mile or so — then adjust for your amenities and the season. Don't start from your mortgage payment; the market doesn't care what you owe. Here's how to price your rental.

Do I need a property manager to rent out my house for the first time?

No — plenty of first-time landlords self-manage successfully, especially with one nearby property and some spare time. A full-service local manager is worth the fee when you want to be truly hands-off, own multiple doors, or live far from the property; the local presence is real value. And there's a middle option: self-management software handles the repetitive work while you keep the decisions, at a fraction of the cost. The real question isn't whether you can do it yourself, it's what happens when something goes wrong at an inconvenient time.

What insurance do I need as a first-time landlord?

Generally a landlord (dwelling) policy rather than a homeowners policy, plus a lease requirement that your tenant carries renters insurance. Tell your insurer before the tenant moves in, not after.

How long does it take to rent out a house?

It depends heavily on your market — as of November 2025, average time on market ranged from 29 days in Cheyenne to 147 in Boston, with a 67-market average of 60 days. The more useful number is the window: most rentals lease in their first 7 to 14 days on the market, and homes that lease within a week typically draw more than 20 inquiries in that first week. If your first seven days are quiet, that's a pricing or listing problem surfacing early — not a slow market. (Nomad market tracking, November 2025.)

Can I rent out my house if I still have a mortgage?

Usually yes, but check your loan documents. Some mortgages — particularly certain owner-occupancy loans — have occupancy requirements for an initial period. Your HOA may have rental restrictions or caps too, so read those before you list.

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