All Forum Posts by: John N.

@Walker Noon LOL, no doubt I have some questionable friends and family but that's not the reason. Inevitably it will end up costing you money or a friendship. Maybe not the first time or the second time but somewhere along the way my advice will be ignored and Someone is going to rent to their friends kid or Aunt Judy's step-son and when you refuse to cut them a break because XXXX and charge poor Cousin Leonard a late fee your name will be Mud at the next family reunion. Unless you give the break that one time, then it happens again and again and the Leonard misses a boat payment and has to play catch-up at the credit union The credit union is going to get paid before you do because you ain't no kinda man if your bass boat get repossessed and you have lost money and Aunty Judy just laughs at you because your people "never were any good with their money"

Repeat after me NEVER RENT TO FRIENDS OR FAMILY. NEVER RENT TO FRIENDS OR FAMILY. And the last thing, never rent to friends or family.

I live in Panama City, Florida. Last year we had a Cat 5 hurricane that basically turned everything upside down in our RE market. An interesting fact came out recently. The Panama City\Bay County area has the exact opposite owner/renter ratio than the national average. Our market is 70% rental and 30% owner occupied. The has caused a huge problem because of the number of displaced renters. There are simply no rental out there for them. Countless businesses cannot reopen or have limited hours a year later because there are no job seekers. I don't really have a question here, just sharing and soliciting discussion. The situation has made purchasing new rental properties impossible because all values are hyper-inflated for the short term.

Your obvious first step is to determine who actually owns the house. Bank owned? reverse mortgage? children? Finding out who owns the property should be as easy as going to your county property appraisers office and look it up. Step two, Clerk of the Court to see if any kind of probate has been started. Step three, tax collectors office to see if its taxes are paid or if there is an opportunity to purchase a tax deed.

Dennis M "———! Motivated sellers are the master key to getting cheap houses . You market to them" This exactly! At some point when I was a teenager I was working with a guy who had a few rental properties. Back then I thought he was about the richest person you could be. He took me seriously and spoke to me like an adult. The one pice of advice he gave me over and over and over was "Never buy distressed properties, buy properties from distressed owners" Best advice I have ever gotten.

Landlords are not the weird/loud/smelly/ugly/intimidating neighbor police. You own the property but it is their residence. They are responsible for their interactions with neighbors.

Wow, interesting thread. I have two points. Number 1, SSDI is based on previous income. •90% of the first $926 of average indexed monthly earnings. •32% of the average indexed monthly earnings over $926 through $5,583, and. •15% of the average indexed monthly earnings over $5,583 If you have "never worked a job in your life" you are not going to get much of a check. Number 2, Anyone who puts veterans benefits and SSDI in the same category doesn't really know what either one of them are. I suggest they go sit outside their local VA hospital and look at the sacrifices some veterans have made. Besides, that not all veterans disabilities are obvious, 22 veterans a day commit suicide. That's about a vet every 65 minutes of every day, every month, every year. I'm going to stop now before I get myself banned from this forum but, how dare you compare a disabled vet with someone committing SSDI fraud. "Veterans benefits are the new welfare" my ***!

@jim vanhorn

Jim, no wifi required.  Simplisafe base units are cell powered.  They provide you with either an att or Verizon SIM card, whichever you prefer for best service.  No extra charge for that, just at part of monitoring service.   It does require electricity but it does have a 24 hour back up battery.

I use them for my residence and I have my portable system I set up in empty rental with motion detector.   I set it for 0 seconds till alarm if triggered and I just turn it off with the app before I go in or let anyone else in.

@Account Closed That post ought to be a sticky.  Thanks for the great info.

The solution is simple and inexpensive.  Purchase a SimpliSafe alarm system.  Only purchase a keypad, a transmitter and one or two motion detectors.  The are super simple self install items that you can put in your house when its vacant and when you rent the house you put the alarm components back in the box, put it back on your closet shelf, go onto your phone app and stop the monitoring service until the house is empty and your portable security system is back in place. There is no contract and no minimums.  Its all batteries, no wires and works great. You can also put a smoke/fire detector in your kit if you like.  Its worth every penny, it keeps out vandals, thieves, and squatters.

John