All Forum Posts by: Brian Mathews

In your original post you commented you had a planned trip the first week of March.   Its a matter of semantics what you want to call it.  You are going out of town for an extended time.   If it were simply an overnight or 2 night trip.  Not an official vacation.   I wouldn't think it would be that big of a deal to wait that time for your rent.   I think the issue was that you sounded very self centered and entitled that your tenants should have to pay rent early as not to inconvenience you when you were the one that chose to create the issue.  

Good luck.   I was talking to somebody this morning about central Texas and finding deals on houses.    They are there, but you have to dig for the nugget.    Unfortunately with as many people that are moving here lately and the housing market being strong, people aren't as willing to give a deal on a house.   I was looking at a few repos in my neighborhood, one on my street that had sat there for many years.    It needed a lot of work due to being neglected.   The price of buying it was too close to what it would cost to buy a move in ready house in the same neighborhood.    Especially after you factored in the repairs needed.  It would cost more to buy and fix than just buy and move in.  

If you're not there to deposit the check, what good is post dating it?  Neither of my banks will take a check more than 1 day in advance of when they are written.  You would have to wait until you got back to deposit it, so in essence it's the same as just waiting until you get back to receive it.    If the money is that crucial, just postpone your trip for one week so you can collect your rent.   If you are going to ask for it early, you need to give a little and give them a rent reduction for the month.  

I think you might have a very tough time accomplishing that.   What do you bring to the table?   What will your role be?  How much money are you putting in?   Nobody is going to partner with you or lend money if you don't have experience or something to offer the partnership.   They are taking all the risk and have the experience. 

I've had a couple of repo's in my neighborhood I've looked at and I replace or repair hvac systems on Fannie Mae properties.    They were in no way a deal.  After the cost of the home then the cost to bring it up to a selling point or able to rent them, it was a losing proposition.   

Take over his side of the debt and tell him goodbye.   He doesn't get to realize any profit on it until there is profit on it, which is when it is sold.   Who knows what it will sell for or what damage will be done before the tenant moves out.   You can't have your cake and eat it too.   I would put it on the market to sell,  whatever is left after it is sold you split it, if there is a loss, then you both get to eat it.   This is why it is very important if you go into a partnership, that everything is very well defined before any money changes hands.  As they say, the only ship that won't sail is a partnership. 

Put it in writing and make it all legal.  It would sure be a shame after all the work is done and he's refinanced in his name to tell you to take a hike.  Or halfway through the process the two of you have a disagreement about something and you both lose.    Money makes people do some weird things. 

Or they watch YouTube and attempt the repair themselves or call their brother in law that thinks how hard can it be.   I'm not paying that $100 and you end up spending $1500 to undo what he did.   I think that's the deductible he speaks of.  

You charge the person living in a house you own a deductible to fix issues?  I've never heard of such a thing.   I can see if they caused the damage, but not a random problem.   If I were a tenant, I'd never rent a place from somebody who wanted me to pay for their property. 

So you buy the house and are already losing $300 a month.   Then you tap the equity, increasing the debt service on this house more and losing more money every month.    I'll assume you'll take the equity and buy a few more properties using the money as a down payment, thereby generating more debt service.   Not even sure what you are going to buy yet.  Maybe the next one will generate cash flow, likely enough to cover itself, if you're really lucky, enough to cover the debt service on the original house that you are already losing money on.   When it's all said and done, you might break even if you're really lucky on all properties, hopefully enough to cover repairs, vacancy and other items which arise from having tenants .   I don't know about you, but I don't willingly walk into something knowing I'm going to lose money.  I think you're falling in love with the equity and not factoring in risk.    I personally wouldn't buy something losing money unless the house is rented under market value and you can raise it up in the next few months.  Do like Josh said and flip it.