All Forum Posts by: Mike Bourgeois

@Rob Gallitto Agent is the way to go. Marketing / pricing strategy and local expertise are key. FSBO (for sale by owner) sellers get sued more than any other group in real estate. An agent has a fiduciary duty to protect your best interests, which include protection from the many different liabilities that can pop up during the course of a transaction.

@Eder D. North of Boston, cities like Lowell, Lawrence and Haverhill have high inventories of multi-family properties, strong rental markets, and commuter trains into the city, but if you’re planning to live there with your wife, then understanding the neighborhoods is key. I’m currently house hacking in North Andover with my wife, and one of the reasons we’re doing it here is because she didn’t feel safe in the Lowell, Lawrence, Haverhill neighborhoods we found available properties in.

@Ali Valiahdi I’ve used Follow Up Boss before and would recommend it. Task management is super easy. Managing contacts and deals is a piece of cake. I didn’t find the reports / dashboards to be incredibly robust but it’s possible I just needed some training.

@Gregory Banks I can offer some practical advice and referrals. Just shoot me a message. I’m currently house hacking in a duplex with a 130 yr old fieldstone foundation. Had structural issues (wall caving in) that I addressed a couple years ago. Started with a structural engineer, hired them for drawings, the whole bit.

These kinds of foundations need to be maintained over the years. Mortar, paint & bonding materials deteriorate leaving cracks, gaps, etc. which can be concerning to look at, but this is very often addressed with repointing. I can’t diagnose your issue from the pics (though it seems repointing needed) I can say that there are contractors in this area who will immediately jump to the $35k+ solutions when they see deferred maintenance on these types of foundations. It’s very often overkill.

@Jason Porto generally speaking, I begin with around $10k in reserves for a new unit, and contribute around 11% of gross rent each month towards the reserve account (repairs, vacancy, capex). But of course, “it depends” :)

@Benjamin Amaral - smells like shenanigans. If an applicant doesn’t have a SSN I would not rent to the applying party.

Also regard to immigration status, US citizenship isn’t needed for a SSN. A SSN is typically issued with “permanent residence” (green card) meaning the person becomes legally allowed to live and work in the US. If they can’t provide evidence of this, or a Visa (student, etc) that authorizes the duration of their stay, then they’re here illegally. I’m not suggesting this guy is, just providing some insight.

@Mei Zhu I’ve been using Avail. No complaints other than it does not propagate listings to Zillow, which means I usually create a separate Zillow Rental Manager account to make sure it’s listed there. I admit this defeats the purpose of having an “all-in-one” platform :) but feel free to check it out and judge for yourself

@Aya I. If the rent amount, due dates, etc. are specified in the lease, there’s no need to provide an invoice. However, do make sure you have some form of electronic confirmation that their payment was received. Up to you if you’d like to provide invoices for other costs / fees that the tenant might face. There’s more of a use case here, as these cost details might not be specified in the lease like fixed monthly rent would be.

@Matt Weddon - make sure all reasoning & communication around the rejection stays clear of all federal AND state protected classes under Fair Housing. Consistency of your evaluation criteria is key for staying out of trouble. In-person behavior can be grounds for rejection, would suggest documenting the behavior and related risk to further protect yourself.

@Daniel Kulik a robust work order / repair management module would be great. Something that easily integrates to the Accounting module so that $ amounts from repairs are easily and automatically reflected in the Accounting functionality / reports. Also, ideally, something that allows the landlord to upload receipts and have OCR technology capture and input the data where it needs to be in the system automatically.