All Forum Posts by: James W.

Do you have a link @Michael Tempel?  I have not heard of this before.  

It is interesting what some cities are doing.  I was looking at a house in Anoka and they are actually trying to reduce the number of rental units in their city.  Many cities do not have enough, but Anoka is limiting applications and their goal it to have more owner occupied RE in the area.  

 Sometimes it is just easier to go over the old sheetrock and save a lot of time-especially if it has been painted many times. 

Might be best for them to just sell it and rent if they are later in life.  That would provide them with the cash to live off of/invest if they please.  If they decide to do neither, they will be able to live on their own longer before they decide to move in with you.

They need some financial planning advice regardless.

I'm not sure I would like the idea of trying to help family out while putting their house at risk-especially if you are not experienced.  The last thing you want to do is create more problems for them by trying the help.

@Ryan Weddle As stated, your 4 plex will be valued based on comparable comps regardless of the expense efficiencies/inefficiencies as the appraiser will not have the info to analyze each property.

The last 4 plex appraisal I saw looked at comparable properties, to determine the value, but also looked at the rents of the subject property and allocation of expenses for the property to complete a brief analysis of that as well.  

The good and bad about 1-4 family in my area is that many of these places have been selling at a premium, which would provide a seller with more value than if they were sold on a cap rate.  People seem to be buying them even if they do not cash flow at this time.  

You don't need business cards to be in RE.  Focus on figuring our how you will get your first deal.  Business cards will not help that.

BTW, I do not have them and it hasn't hurt me one bit.  

I agree with @Caleb Heimsoth.

Do not spend money one seminars and put it into a REIT if you are set on REI until you get enough to go in on your own.

Even if you could find a way into a deal, you would not have any reserves and any problems may be hard to manage.

+1 on a local credit union.  I won't go for it myself, but mine will do 100% financing for a primary residence.  Rates usually differ between 90% and 100% so it might be worth looking into.

I'm not sure if you plan on renting or occupying as a homeowner but the others have provided you with some good advice.

1. Make sure you understand the rules of the HOA (some do not allow renting and some might have a fee of $300 each time you move someone out or in=$600 per tenant change)

2. Look at the condition of the HOA and their reserves

3. Get a feel for the type of people that live their

One of the reason condos/townhomes look so attractive is their low price, but you really should look at what the $300-$400/mo is going to do for you. I have not owned a place with a HOA, but I have run numbers on some to determine what the price difference is for a single family home in the area if you factor in the cost of the dues as being able to afford a more expensive place. In some areas, for the HOA cost, you still would not be able to buy a SFR, where as others, the cost difference of the HOA would make it affordable to buy a SFR instead of a townhome/condo.

Are the ranges electric or gas?  I could see the service being too low for each unit if they have electric ranges, A/Cs and electric baseboard heat.  

I'm not an electrician, but my understanding is that you could possibly increase the panels to 100 amps but it may or may not require you to increase your main service.  16 units X 60 amps=960 amps if everything was used to capacity, but it doesn't always work that way.  It is common to have a 100 amp box with more than 100 amps worth of breakers in that box, but if you upgraded them all to 100 AMP panels, I don't think your 800 AMPs of service would pass for 1600 AMPS of service going to all of the boxes.  

It would probably be easiest to find another insurance provider, but 60 AMPs is low, especially if several of your appliances are electric.  It might not be a bad idea to see what it would cost to upgrade your service as well.  

It is something they need to work out on their own.  I would probably look into getting someone else to do the shoveling if this is how your tenant is going to do it.  Maybe tenant 3 would be interested for reduced rent.