All Forum Posts by: Diane McDonald

Thanks all - yes, I definitely am in over my head with this place. @Stanley Ezeadi nailed it: I hired the wrong people at least three times right at the very beginning, which accounts for about half of the expenditure. Had my option period estimates been accurate and my hydrostatic test done correctly, I would never have bought the place, but it's too late to change that. 

 @Kevin Sobilo, I never meant this to be an investment property per se; my intention was to live in the house at least 4-5 years and maybe rent the apartment to a student to help keep my living costs down. Staying that long myself isn't working out for personal reasons, which is why I was debating whether or not it would make any sense to hang onto it and rent the whole thing out.

I do have a few people coming to take a look and give their advice regarding the best path forward from here, and I'm grateful for that!

Hi all, I'm in a pickle with my first home. In 2021, I bought a 3br 2ba house built in 1940, with an attached 1 br 1 ba apartment addition. I knew it needed a full rewire (still had knob & tube) but did *not* know what a big deal that was going to turn out to be. It also had a number of other issues I wasn't aware of, despite having had it inspected. All told, I've spent $105k on repairs so far, which is $85k more than I had anticipated.

There's still a slew of work to be done to make either unit rentable. The estimates I have for everything remaining is $30k for the main house and $45k for the apartment.

I currently live in the house but plan to move out of state as soon as I can. If I rented out both the house and the apartment I'd probably only get $2800-3000/mo combined, and would have to pay a property manager as well since I'd be out of state. 

So here's where I'm stuck: If I sell the house now, I think I'll be lucky if I can sell it for what I paid ($300k), so I may as well have just lit that $105k (and closing costs) on fire. If I dump another $75k into getting it fixed up, I'll have to hang onto it for a looooong time to even get close to breaking even. The house is "in the loop" and near UH, so finding renters shouldn't be hard, and I anticipate that the land will increase in value over time... but I worry it will somehow continue to present me with a new $20k problem every quarter or so. I will have addressed pretty much all the systems so in theory it should stabilize, but my experience with this place so far doesn't inspire confidence. 

SO: Just get out and accept my losses? Or get deeper and hope it one day sortof almost pays off? How do you all make these decisions?