All Forum Posts by: Dick Rosen

Hi @Tanner Sortillo,

I'm a former fix/flipper/wholesaler, did about 40 deals, ended up with 33 rentals. Decided I liked the property management business the best, moved to AZ in 2011, gradually sold all of my rentals in Minnesota, flipped a couple more in Mesa while getting my Real Estate license to do property management. Since 2015 I have been a Broker/Property Manager, me and my Daughter have been doing property management ever since. She does a few sales now and then particularily she likes to represent our PM Clients when they decide to sell. Let me know if you need any help with contacts or PM. 

@Brian Kloft, very good and thorough response. I like everything you've said and respect what you have accomplished. The one thing that I think you are overlooking is the legal issues that a good local PM will be in tune with. Personally I spend more time keeping up with changing legislation, Fair Housing Laws etc than I do anything else. And it appears that things coming down from legistaion and HUD in 2024 is only going to make it worse. This seems to me to be a very important part that investors just aren't aware of and in fact a lot of PM's are not up to speed either. We believe that a good PM will save you more money than they cost in the long run. Not to mention it just simply gives you that time back.

Moussa, we would be happy to talk with you about your rental properties. Majority of our clients are out odf state and they seem to like our small company with hands on attitude. You can reach out and I will connect you with Jamie if you'd like to talk about it. You can also check us out on the web at LHMRealty.com

First and foremost you want an expert property manager on your team. A good PM knows how market for good tenants and they know how to screen for good tenants. Having good tenants is have the battle.

Not true, with one property, self managed, you do not have to pay TPT.

I don't know what OP is, I'm going by what the Dept of Revenue tells us but we are coming up with the same answer. I'm not disputing your answer at all, just different resources I guess.

Ryan is correct, if you use a PM they should take care of this for you, if not, look for a new PM. But if you manae yourself and only have 1 property you do not have to pay the TPT tax. Last I heard was an individual could own and manage 2 properties without TPT and at one time that number was 4 so don't quote me on that part.

I'm not sure about Ryan's statement about per City, now that the state is collecting and manaing the TPT system for the cities it may be state wide rather than per city.

Sounds like you are pretty well focused on Austin but if you decide to do something in the Phoenix area I'd be happy to help you out.

We've used several different vendors for termite treatment and yes they can all be priced differently and they are probably all using different chemicals. My clients typically go for the 1 year warranty but they renew every year which comes with an inspection and additional treatment as needed. If you plan to keep the property for the long run, a longer warranty would probably come out cheaper but you still need to keep up the renewals. 

I've been told and I tend to believe that once you have termites they will always be back so your best off maintaining the warranty.

@Elizabeth Schartman I completely agree with @Bill B.'s remarks regarding the cost of repairs and maintenance and the mindset that you have to have as a landlord. But I also agree with you that it sounds like your PM did a poor job of qualifying the tenant. Criminal backgraound can be really tricky with today's Fair Housing laws but the past landlord verification and emplyment verification was apparently not properly done. I do agree that you need a new PM!

A short story for you, we completely screened and verified new tenants for an apartment, moved them in in August. By September we realized that our approved tenant moved in some other people with very bad records. It took us the month of October to get them out and yes we had over $2000 in damage and repairs plus legal fees. We had 2 separate attorneys reveiw our files and they both ran their own background checks and they both said that we did nothing wrong, we got scammed. My reason for telling you this is because I feel we are a very good and reputable PM company and it happens to us now and then also. Not all tenants are good people, the trick is to find the good ones.