All Forum Posts by: Edward Burns

@Pedro Plencher

should I even consider getting this property? You would have to run a financial analysis of the property to determine this. Rent income, expenses, major maintenance all have to be known.

My only problem is I'm a college student without a job. Are there any alternate routes I can use to get this property without. Without any visible income, financing would be extremely difficult. If it is a real good deal, you might consider wholesaling the deal to someone.

I'm experimenting with interlocking tile that can installed as a floating floor for kitchens and bathrooms. There are four basic types I have found. The cheapest is essentially a plastic tray and plastic tile cast as one piece. The other 3 have tile or laminate or stone glued to a plastic tray.

In all 4 cases the individual trays interlock to form the floor. In all cases they can be laid over existing flooring or subflooring even if there are minor floors in the existing surface (ie gaps, broken tile, shifted peel and stick type tile) providing the imperfection is not large. Each of four types leave a gap of about 2mm between tiles meaning some from of grout is needed. All appear to have the property of the basic surface material. The plastic tile and CVT type can cut using standard power saws. Porcelain and stone require a tile saw for cutting. Have not tried cutting the wood laminate type. All have there own advantages and disadvantages. Time to lay a 13x10 with a 10x6 L kitchen floor is about 1.5 hours including cutting tile as needed but not including grouting time.

@Tony Wooten

EMD = Earnest Money Deposit

Not knowing the full situation makes it hard to suggest a course of action.

From your comments, it appears as if you may rented part of the house (or apartment) to two separate unrelated people. If that is the case, then I believe you some responsibility for the safety of the tenant and his property and should provide the lock. On the otherhand if you rented the place to the tenants jointly (friends, couple whatever) and they have been having a lover type squabble avoid the situation and do not renew the lease with either one.

Being you are located across the country, I would not even attempt to try to manage it myself. Even with the help of friends, you would still have to reimburse for their time and expenses IMO, so you would not be savings 7-10% of the property incoming rent. When you add in your admitted lack of experience, it becomes even more apparent the professional PM is your best bet.

Financing a vacant lot is possible. Just apply for loan at a bank, etc. the same as you would with any other real estate. However, usually the most that can borrowed on vacant land is 50% of its appraise value (note this is not the assessed value). Also, with a loan of such small principle, you would probably do better with a personal or business loan using the property as collateral.

My understanding is that The paperwork must be received by the HUD Asset Manager within 2 days. Since the Asset Manager usually is not local that means the paperwork has to be sent via overnight delivery. So instead of the 2 days everybody quotes and since HUD usually responds to winning bids in the afternoon, you really have one day to handle the paperwork and submit the earnest money.

I would take $150K and put it into a Margin Account with a Stock Brokerage, earmark $150K for real estate investments and put the remaining $100K into savings.

Because both the stock and real estate funds can be margined, you would have buying power of about $300K in the stock market, and $600K in real estate. Coupled with the savings give you Million Dollars to control. If I am able to clear even 3% on that (after all expenses including interest and loan payments) that gives me $30K income which being single, with my house fully paid for and no debt currently is more than my current annual expenses.

First, the water is safe. But to ease your conscious call your water utility and ask the pH of the water (they are required to test this regularly so its no additional work for them. Between about 6.5 and 8.5 is fine (7.0 is neutral)). Also ask if they recently changed or repaired the mains in you area (if the mains have been, the delivery pressure may have been increased slightly and while water meters usually dampend this they do not stop it completely.)

Second, while Rob K is correct that there could be cathodic corrosion occurring that usually requires a moist environment which inside a house would indicate other problems.

Other possibilities are a just a bad (weak) batch of copper piping. It happens but not often or bad installation (check the joints for weeping). Don't forget water hammers could also being causing the problems, but you should have noticed them if that is the problem.

I would look at replacing the pipes regardless of the cause.

You appear to have experience and a system that works for you. If that is the case, then it is not a situation that you afraid to take the plunge into real estate investing. Given that assumption, I would pass on the deal for two reasons. One, I trust my instincts (and your apparent reluctance to pull the trigger indicates your instincts are against it). Two, you apparently have a system that works while tweaking a system is ok, don't abandon what works.