All Forum Posts by: Canneton Howard

I did a cashout refinance with Huntington on a property that was valued at about $55k so the loan was about $47k which they had no problem doing. Dort is another credit union in the area which might be able to help you out.  

I thought that if you switched the title to an LLC after the fact, the bank could see that as a sale and require full payment. Maybe I'm mistaken on this but do your research.

Thanks for the additional information Drew!

Thanks @Todd Dexheimer and @Teri Feeney Styers

I looked through that doc with the codes for my area and couldn't find anything about individual furnaces in a multi-family unit. I'll probably call them to confirm but so far it looks like I'm ok.

Thanks for all the comments.

Yes, ideally I would like to have two furnaces but again the cost for it is a big cash flow killer. I'll start with finding out what the local building code is and go from there. @Teri Feeney Styers where can I get such information on the building codes? I looked up El Paso (Pikes Peak Regional Building Department) but I didn't see anything specific for building codes. 

@Todd Dexheimer, aren't the electrical baseboards a fire risk, especially with tenants? Just seems like a higher risk. Not throwing out your idea completely, just trying to look at all the pros and cons. 

@Tim Swierczek, I don't think that applies to my situation since I pay for the utilities and bill it back to the tenants. I take the average of the utility bills and split it 60/40 since one of the units is larger than the other. I know a lot of people will argue against that, but I haven't had any issues with it.

Thanks @Alex Deacon and @Todd Dexheimer.

This is a SFH that was converted to a duplex years ago, so the utilities are not split (I pay for them) and located in the lower unit. Not a bad idea though with the electric baseboards, but again the utilities are not split. The controls are upstairs but funny enough its the bottom unit that gets hotter.

I had two quotes. I just found one of them and it was closer to $11,500 after some discounts. Still, I was only budgeting to replace 1 furnace, not 2 with additional duct work.

So I'm understanding that there is no issue with having only 1 furnace for the two units and no code that would prevent me from doing this.  Sad that so many contractors are that dishonest. 

I bought a duplex in Colorado Springs last year with a single furnace knowing that it was old and would probably need to be replaced in the next few years.

I had a few companies give me quotes on separating the HVAC for the two units which would obviously require adding a lot of duct work in one of the units. 

The cost of installing 2 units and duct work was around $13k. 

That was a lot more than I expected and when asked to get a quote for just replacing the current furnace they said they can't do that with a Multifamily unit. Something about it not meeting code. However, that never came up when I had an inspection done on the property when I bought it. 

Is that true? Can I really not just replace the single furnace in the duplex?

I would appreciate any suggestions on this.

Thanks @Bill S.

Good point on checking on owner occupy rules. I don't plan on living there so definitely want to get that cleared up.

I was also just thinking if it's easier to split the lots. The legal description for all the properties in this area are listed as two lots. Not sure if anyone can comment on that.

Anyone have any prices for building these types of additional units?

Thanks @Michael Randle

I did contact the county on this a few weeks back but it basically came down to I needed to have plans ready in order to meet with the planner. Seems kind of silly to go to those extremes when I just wanted to get some information about the process, regulations, etc.

Are you currently in process of building or still playing the waiting game?

I bought a duplex unit in Colorado Springs about 6 months ago and want to continue to grow my portfolio but with prices going up, nothing in the area is making sense to buy at the moment. However, the lot that this duplex is on is plenty big to build an additional 1-2 units (detached from main unit). 

It is currently zoned as an R2 so technically I shouldn't have any issues building an ADU. I would however like to maximize my ROI so ideally I would like to build another duplex. Obviously this would depend on getting it rezoned to an R4.

First of all, has anyone recently tried to rezone to an R4 in El Paso county and what was your experience?

Assuming that I can get it rezoned to an R4, is it worth the extra costs/hassle to go this route?

I've started talking to a GC and according to him, the fees associated with 1 tap vs 2 jumps from ~$5500 to ~$19000 along with other fees and red tape. He's finishing up building a duplex on his own property and says he wishes he'd gone with just a single unit.

Has anyone else gone through the experience of building additional units on a rental property (or your own property for that matter)?

What $/sq ft should I expect for something like this in this area?

I appreciate any feedback the BP community might have on this.

@Martin Potter

When does this smaller group meet?