All Forum Posts by: Jon K.

OP in your neighborhood. Lightning stopped us for the night at Houston International.  

Actually your door question made me think.  At one time we owned personally 1,300 doors.  About to build a 300 door location.   But Self storage.  Sounds good for the ego, but means nothing financially.

We approached @James Hamling wife question about 4 years ago.  When is enough enough.  My theory was always “more”.   With a starting point of $300 cash, $100 pickup and a sack of clothes.  We finally hooked up with a wealth management firm.  The first year was just pulling together what we owned and putting it into their system.  Then we asked the question how much is enough.  
1.  How to retire with no job?$$$$$.    With an annual living expense of $xxx

 
2.    How to not worry about the stock market or our other investments going up or down.  We picked 5 years of living expenses in cash equivalents.  Our stock positions are our 20 year and further money.  Our midterm wealth are our real estate investments and cash flow.

3.  Insurance to cover our exposure while in the middle of a development since it would loose 80% of its value if not completed.  Plus debt coverage.

We found out we had to much worth.  Did a trust and assigned so much to our son.  Then to two other young relatives.   Then to several community projects whatever is left over.

I used to do a similar exercise with high school kids who would come thru by asking them life style questions.  Spouse, kids, cars, boats, pay college, big house, vacations, etc etc.   Then back into annual pay.   Then back into a profession or college.  To help them answer how much is enough.  

This would be a great exercise on a podcast or tool for new REI investors. Help them identify their REI path.

Hi everyone,

I’m not sure exactly why I’m writing this — maybe to vent, maybe in hopes that someone out there understands — but I’m at the end of my rope as a small landlord in Philadelphia.

I own just one duplex. I live in one unit and rent out the other. I remember when my first tenants moved in — I was excited and proud. I felt like I was contributing to society in a new way by becoming a housing provider.

The first tenants weren’t perfect, but things were manageable… until they stopped paying rent and ghosted me completely. After I posted a 10-day notice, one of them finally reached out and told me he had been laid off. I empathized and worked with them as best I could, but I didn’t renew the lease. Lesson learned: tenant screening is critical.

So next time around, I decided to stay anonymous (for safety, since I live alone), and I hired a property manager hoping they’d screen better. On paper, the new tenant looked great — worked for a major healthcare provider, decent credit, stable income, low debt.

Two months in: late rent. From month three onward: no rent at all.

In Philly, eviction starts with the Eviction Diversion Program (EDP), which delays things by about a month. My tenant ignored the assistance option. So we moved on to court, which had a 2.5-month wait. The night before the court hearing, she suddenly started panicking and applied for aid — far too late to matter.

The judge pushed for “pay and stay,” and I got a Judgment by Agreement. She agreed to resume rent payments and repay the arrears in installments. Then… nothing.

So I filed for lockout — and in Philly, sheriff lockouts are 2–3 months behind. In the meantime, I have to live under the same roof with a tenant who doesn’t pay, doesn’t care, and regularly invites people over, being loud and disruptive like she has nothing to lose.

I’ve been depressed. I’ve felt trapped and powerless in my own home. At one point, I honestly felt so low that I had thoughts I never thought I’d have. It’s hard. Really hard.

Philadelphia’s tenant-friendly laws are important in protecting people from bad landlords — I get that — but there’s no protection for small landlords like me who are just trying to provide decent housing and live peacefully in our own homes. I have no rights to comfort, peace, or timely justice. I feel punished for trying to do the right thing.

I used to think being a landlord was a way to build wealth and help others. Now, all I want is to get out of this business as soon as I can.

Thanks for reading.

Hello friends, I am sure a lot of you would have gone through signing a new lease with your tenant where within 1 or 2 years of tenancy the tenant vacates a property. You had done a lot of due diligence and research on the tenant, yet it failed to identify the tenant is going to stay long term.

What are the clever tricks you have used to be sure this tenant is a long term rental prospect? When I show the property I ask them questions about current life situation. But try not to directly ask a question how long you plan to stay. Sometime the tenant himself mentions I will be buying my own home but need a year or two to save for downpayment (red flag for me as a landlord), however not all tenants are forthcoming. Some will fake their intent and say I plan to live here long term.

Any tricks and ideas how you would go about this?

 Great idea about having them check off different items on a list. There have been times it would’ve been good for me to have checked out some items for myself. Lol.

So the question is what’s your thoughts on networking and is it over rated.

From my own experience, going to meet ups and talking big game with newbies was l not all that beneficial.  Going to meet ups and being exposed to a pitch fest was not all that beneficial either. Being somebody’s lap dog probably would not be beneficial for me…I never gave that a shot. Lol

What I have found for myself to be beneficial was marketing and getting in front of sellers and pretty well closing my ears and eyes from those that were talking big game so I did not get discouraged.. I’ve never had anyone take me under their wing, but that’s possibly because my personality does not seek out that kind of arrangement.

I am not a realtor or a lender so I do not have any perspective personally for that when it comes to networking.

What’s your thoughts on networking?

PS my Title was supposed to be (is networking overrated,), but I cannot edit it. Maybe a moderator can.

@Dan H.

agree.  there is no such thing as 'cash flow from day 1.'  is there a way to buy without paying closing costs?

I want to bring some reality to the situation which is 99.9% of us do not become financially free through rental properties (or real estate). Its a great asset class that is a long term play, but those thinking to get financially free at a young age, I would say go into tech.

I graduated with a friend, same degree. In 2011 he went and worked in tech for NVIDIA, I have been in real estate. His net worth is 5x mine and mine is pretty darn good. He is financially and time independent. Getting their through rentals is great for building wealth but do not count on leaving your job unless you are becoming active in real estate which is still a job.

Sorry just my 2 cents.

When I acquired a 6 unit property in Hartford, CT in 2022, the neighborhood appeared as just working class. Soon after, the neighborhood went from class C to class F. I stuck with the same PM, owned by Tom Kopchick, because they knew the building and neighborhood quite well. Unfortunately, things went South really fast. I thought, let me evict the non-paying tenants and replace them with paying ones. Well this was like pulling teeth. Units were not flipped because the PM blamed it on the bad neighborhood and said that govt programs were the way to go if I wanted a consistent rent roll. He never told me that it would take several months to get funds from these entities. I ended up with 4 empty units and 2 paying tenants, then only 1 paying tenant. I still paid the mortgage on time, but was a struggle at times borrowing money from friends and family just to do so. A veteran was finally put in one of the units (the one paying tenant), however, the PM failed to tell him to open his own electricity acct and after 6 months, ended up with over $2000 of charges under my LLC. When I went by the building one day, they refused to let me into another vacant unit because they said once a govt program takes over while they find a tenant, I as the owner cannot have access to it. This unit ended up costing my LLC over $1800 in electricity charges when it was supposed to be vacant. The electricity shot up to over 3000 kw over the winter prompting me to think they had a grow house in there or a squatter the PM was collecting rent from himself.

In a neighborhood like this, you need a very competent PM. Instead, I ended up with the worst and most incompetent in the state, if not the whole country. They never got back to me on anything. It was, "yeah I'll take care of it" and I'd never hear from them again. Some of the problems were not taken care of at all. Homeless people were shacking up in the basement and breaking windows on the ground level trying to get inside one of the units. The PM had a manager who stuck her "friend" in one of the units prior to my acquisition and because they had a fall out, she stopped paying rent so I got no revenue from that unit for 7 months. The PM was horrible at trying to evict her and she finally abandoned the place, costing me over $9000 in lost revenue. When I attempted to replace them with another PM, Tom begged me to keep him on. Like an idiot and a firm believer that everybody deserves a second chance, I proceeded to continue on with them. Huge mistake. Things got much worse. He deliberately used a plow to destroy my driveway when there was snow, prompting my insurance company to come after me. In the two estimates I got to repave the driveway which were around $7000, Tom wanted 15K for it. It seemed to me that things were broken so they can make money off of the repairs. A PM could easily get away with this. There was a leak in the skylight above the inside hallway and they implied that I needed to redo the entire roof because of that one leak. That would've cost me over 20K. 

In trying to get another PM to come on board which none would touch with a 10 foot pole and my hemorrhaging money left and right, I decided to put it on the market. Tom the PM got upset because he wanted to sell it for me, but I told him that if he was inept as a PM, what made him think he would be great at selling my building? All reviews of this PM on the internet are all horrible. Goes to show you that before you contemplate hiring a PM, ALWAYS check their reviews first. Most lie through their teeth. Additionally, he never charged me a "percentage" of the rent roll as stated in the agreement. It was always a flat fee of over $600 whether I had 4 tenants or 1. With the appreciation, I didn't lose as much money as I thought, but had I held onto it, I would've gone bankrupt and had the building go into foreclosure, all because of their incompetence. Again, I tried my best to find another PM, but there were no takers. It's PMs like these that ruin the reputation for the others. I truly believe that they can steal from under you and get away with it. Even the REIA in CT was of no help. An entity that supposedly "helps" investors, but said nothing on how to avoid bad PMs. Besides them, I contacted the AG of CT, the mayor and an attorney to see about suing them. I got no help whatsoever. The state literally has enablers that allow rogue PMs to get away with a lot and I'm sure this is like this across the country. The Dept of Consumer Protection was a joke and was of no help either. Everyone assumes landlords have bottomless pockets so they don't really care about them. I sought advice on Biggerpockets, only to get berated and spoken condescendingly by other investors. It's as if I was supposed to have a crystal ball and why didn't I do this or that. Were they successful on their FIRST INVESTMENT? Crickets. It was more like "look at me, everything I touch turns to gold". Yeah right. Now, I'm focused on fixing and flipping. An endeavor I look forward to, as I refuse to get discouraged in my real estate journey.