Short answer: The delinquency ratio is the total amount tenants owe you (0–30 days, 30–60 days and beyond) divided by your facility’s monthly gross potential income. Mark’s target for a stabilized facility is 5% or less.
How to calculate it #
- Pull last night’s daily close or a delinquency report and find the total delinquency owed, all of it.
- Find the facility’s monthly gross potential income (many daily close reports show it).
- Divide the first number by the second.
Illustration only: if tenants owe $5,500 in total and gross potential monthly income is $48,000, the delinquency ratio is about 11.5%, more than double Mark’s 5% target.
Why 5%? #
The 5% allows for normal late payers in the first 10 to 15 days, who also pay late fees. Much more than that tells Mark it is time for an auction, or that the way rent is being collected isn’t working. He has seen facilities far higher, including a group of facilities at 67%, mostly because of weak collections and payment plans.
Above 5%, the usual causes are not auctioning (or not auctioning fast enough), allowing payment plans, or weak collection procedures. All three can be fixed, which is why Mark sees a high ratio as an opportunity rather than a dead end.
Related answers #
- How can a self-storage facility improve rent collections?
- Why should self-storage owners auction delinquent units promptly?
- What is the difference between physical and economic occupancy in self-storage?
Source: Mark’s posts The Four Metrics Every Self-Storage Operator Should Track Monthly and Self-Storage Revenue Strategies for 2026 Part 2 – Improve Collections
