All Forum Posts by: James DeRoest

Easy way to get rid of fleas - clear the entire house and then bomb it. $10 for a pack of three bombs. Use them all at once. (leave cupboards open, pull the appliances from the walls, etc).

I don't have any carpeted houses but if I did, I'd then have the carpets cleaned. 

I did clear one house of fleas by sending my dog in by accident. They literally all jumped on him (poor guy). Capstar'd him at home. $7 to clear the house.

Each state will have it's own rules so you need to check them out.

In Florida for instance, If there are defects in the property that need to be addressed because they affect the habitability of the property, then you send a letter by certified mail and keep the receipts. I believe you can then withhold rent - and if it ever went to court the judge will ask "did you send a certified letter to the landlord?" "Well yes I did your honor" and at that point whatever case the landlord is making is more or less history.

Personally, I'd send the certified letter, withhold the next rent and the Landlord will soon be in contact when he hasn't been paid.

What's your downtime going to be like, and how long will it take to make up the difference? Eg, if the tenant can only afford $600 instead of $650, the property is empty for a month if the tenant leaves, then it'll take you 13 months to make up that missing month.

In my opinion, empty properties don't make money.

FWIW, we have dropped rents for tenants in the past, like the couple who had just had a child and her company fired her when she went into labor three weeks early. We dropped $50pm for 6 months.

I will guarantee you it's not $9000 of repairs. This seems to be fairly standard by property managers when they are giving up on your property; stuff the landlord with some ridiculous quite and hope they go away.

Find out what the problems are and start getting real quotes.

Carpet, you were onto a loser in the first place, but don't underestimate how good a professional carpet cleaning company can be. It could be $150 well spent just to see what they can do, see if you can get one more tenant out of them.

As for plumbing being replaced though, see what a plumber will charge you. What's the harm? Our plumber ripped out an entire galvanized system and replaced with Pex for just over $2k. I had one tenant who happened to be a plumber, do exactly same job for $900! (And it was a good job as well). The standard price I've seen is around $3-4K for that job.

I know a friend recently got a bill for $10k for repairs from their PM. They did it themselves in the end, took a day and $323 in parts fromLowes.

What do you have to lose?

 From what you've said, I'm kinda conflicted here.

A. One part of me says that they want to pay rent.

B. But the other half says that this is the run around. Experience says that once the run around starts it never finishes. 

The thing I can't get away from is that it's May12th, why don't I have the rent in my hand by now? And that's why I think it's B, the run around.

Good for you for sending the notice. If they are serious about paying rent, you'll have the full amount within hours.

1st of the month is when many people get paid. Be first in the queue before they spend it.

I hate to say this, but because you did not get control of the situation from the outset, and wanted to work with these people, your problems are simply getting worse.

Ok, so a cop wouldn't have thrown them out (mainly because you can't prove they left), but in trying to work with them, they are setting out the ground rules.

If rent is unpaid today, post whatever notice is required by your state for failure to pay rent, and pursue an eviction.

They are stalling you on payment because they don't have it. Experience says that you won't see a penny from them, so save yourself a whole heap of thinking and getting angry at the situation, start removal proceedings with no more delay.

Sorry if I'm blunt. Just sayin' it the way I see it.

Yes and no. Mainly no.

The problem is that they will always be D neighborhoods, unless you have a specific piece of knowledge that something in the area is changing.

For instance, I've been toying with buying a couple of C/Ds. Seller is in no hurry, and I'm not exactly gung-ho for once. She wants $30k a piece. My inside knowledge is that the county is considering buying the 200 unit ghetto opposite and grinding it into dust. Essentially it keeps flooding, which is kinda what happens when you build 200 apartments in a swamp in a floodplain. The swamp even has a name, so you'd think it was kinda known about.

But anyway, if that apartment complex goes, then that subdivision will definitely improve over time.

One of our multi units is in a C/D, but again, that area is slowly gentrifying itself. The more stuff built downtown, the better that area becomes.

So unless you have some inside knowledge, or know that changes are a foot you could do well.

But.

If you want cheap houses, when you come to sell them in 20 years, what you will have is lots of cheap houses. These houses actually become more of a liability than an asset. Telling people that you own 30 units sounds impressive, but when your bus fare cost more than your portfolio, the glow is short lived.

I know a bunch of slumlords, they are not wealthy people.

I'll get jumped on by the hard nosed landlords, but if you're $150 down and if you get them out of the property, it'll be down for two months and it'll cost you $5k to redo things. So you're down 2x850 +5000=$6700.

Which will now take you $6700/$150=45 months. Not to mention that 45 months is above most tenancy lengths, so expect one turn around which will be another $1000 lost.

So, 45-51 months to get yourself ahead again.

They suddenly don't seem like such a bad deal now.

 You two aren't the odd ones out, I just couldn't be bothered to post as I get GregS on my case lecturing me like a four old.