Rent or Sell?

My wife and I are working out the details that we need to in order to go fulltime. Currently, we are discussing whether we ought to sell the house or rent. We have a three bedroom, one bath ranch (built in '75) with 7.5 acres and are asking 109,000 if we sell. We would like to rent/lease to keep our home for later, but hardly dare, because we have heard many horror stories from folks who have rented their home. Are there any fulltimer's out there who have a good story with a renter in their home? Thanks.

We have been F/T for four years. First year we just let the house sit empty. Then when we got home, we put stuff in storage, gave to Goodwil, had a huge yard sale, and RENTED the house. We have about 10 acres in southern VA right off I-95 (Exit 4 - Skippers). The house is small two bedroom. We rented it to a senior couple in from our church. We keep the rent low. Charge $500 a month and give him a $100 rebate every month for having rent in bank on time and keeping the ground mowed, raked, etc. He does a great job. In three years, not a single problem. We plug into a service behind my shop in the summer and early fall, while we are "home". We usually leave the end of October (29th this year), and head south to Florida, then west (Vegas) toward late winter or early spring, and then north to Oregon / Washington for spring and then early summer back home.
The renters have worked great for us, as we did not want to sell and not have a place to fall back on when we had to.
Hope this helps.
I know there are horror storries about renters, but God has been good to us about this.
Frank

Thanks. I'm glad to hear something encouraging re: this issue. Glad for you, too.

In our life before fulltiming, we rented our house for 5 years (because of PCS). When I retired, we sold the house instead of returning to it. During those 5 years. we had a management company take care of it, collect rent, and find new renters. Our fee was 10% of the monthly rent. It worked well for 5 years and we came out a little ahead each month. No problems, other than minor maintenance, until the last renter. They TRASHED the place and left owing a couple months rent. So after 5 years and considering our losses, the rent collected ended up being about equal to our mortgage payment. But we did see the appreciation in value when we sold it.

This was our first house that we owned, it was newly built and we put alot of work into it. When we moved, it was hard to leave it in someone elses hands, knowing the reputation rentals have. We just had to tell ourselves that the house was no longer home and was simply a piece of investment. We had to seperate ourselves from any emotional ties to the house. When we PCS'd, we didn't know if we would ever return to it or not, but it was always an option. 16 years later, we never have returned to the house. Someday, we want to drive by and see what she looks like. Finanically, it worked to our advantage to keep and rent the house.

One thing -- and this might have been mentioned elsewhere -- when you sell your primary residence, you pay no income tax on the gain as long as you have lived in it for two years of the last five before it's sold ... please don't take my word exactly for that, check with a tax man, but it's something like that -- so if you rent, then sell without living in it again... then you will pay capital gains. So, check with a tax man before you make any permanent plans with the rental idea.

I'm just getting back from a trip up into canada and reading the replies. Thank you folks very much for your input. There are a couple of points we hadn't thought about, but surely will before we make any final decisions.