All Forum Posts by: Justin Fox

The HOA committee is made up of those elite, wealthy family members, right? Turns out, it's not the county/cities job to make sure they're actually paying the taxes, it's theirs.

Right of redemption window has more than lapsed.  The homeowners better get ready to shift some of the 500/mo to the new road owners.

High property taxes keeping the peons out is fine and dandy until the poor buy your road at auction lmao. 

What if the LL immediately filed suit against the tenant for claimed amount?  They wouldn't have to return the full deposit at that point, right?  It even says in section 2, sub-section d that you should try to informally resolve the issue before filing suit.  Makes me think that as long as the LL follows up with the tenant's objection and subsequently files suit (I would suggest before the remaining 15 days are up) if the tenant doesn't concede, that the LL would be fine.

That's pretty standard stuff, even in Texas.  You must send the full deposit back with in 30 days or partial deposit with written description/itemization of deductions (some exceptions if no forwarding address received or rent is due).  If the tenant sues and the LL is found to be in bad faith (conversion/theft) then the LL is liable to 3x amount withheld and reasonable attorney fees in damages.  The burden of proof is on the LL for reasonableness of deductions/charges as well.

I constantly hear about LLs in Texas that simply take the deposit with no written itemization justifying the deductions.  If only tenants knew that the LL simply not sending the itemization guaranteed they'd be awarded $100, 3x the deposit AND their attorney fees lol.

I wouldn't really advertise it.  I would just let them know in the pre-screening via phone call and/or an informational email containing:  Property information, criteria and application.

Going to school to become an anesthesiologist, surgeon or pedodontist are great ways to become much more wealthy than the average median wage earner investing in 200/door cashflow, why doesn't everyone do it?  Desire.

For me to own a 1,000,000 dollar home, it would cost me ~4460 more per month.  That's a lot of cruises, trips to the Frio, atv trips to Mena and snorkeling trips to Cozumel/Honduras at the Money Bar/Half Moon Bay.  I guess I'll always be too lazy to work more just to afford taxes/insurance equal to the median income in my state : (.

I think a better service would be to simply list previous landlords for a given tenant, searchable by drivers license number/state AND/OR first/middle/last name.  That way you could tell if the tenant was lying about having references or conveniently left out a negative mark.  All that would be displayed is a redacted DL for visual confirmation and a contact form for the selected LL, no defamation, no indication of whether or not they were evicted or didn't pay, just a simple 'Request Contact Info by Email' form (would contact the specific LL by the provided email at registration).

A site like this would have to be heavily moderated for LL registration and a LL adding him/herself to a particular tenant as a previous reference.  For instance, LL property ownership verification and first/last page of lease providing the tenant/address/lease-term information and signatures.  Everything would have to be approved hands-on...

Cross-state tenants and fake IDs would be another pickle.

I collect cash and have collected it in the past.  I just keep the ATM deposit receipt stating how much was deposited in cash/check/both and keep it as a payment record and always deposit it the same day paid.  If you take cash and operate your business in a consistent, structured way then you have nothing to worry about.  If you take cash and intentionally try to be shady (evading) then you'll have problems down the road when a tenant claims they've already paid/overpaid/etc.

Also, if someone wants to die over my $625 that's fine by me.

@Ryan Sajdera

Visit your local appraisal district's website.  You can probably submit an appeal/protest online with the value you think it should be and any pictures or evidence of things that would considerably decrease the value of the home.  I don't know about your state but I thought a deadline of April'ish was pretty common.

Your escrow amount can become short due to fluctuations in the actual cost of taxes/insurance and also because they have to have 1 or 2 months reserve of that newly increased amount also.

I would try to raise rents as much as you possibly could if you're past the deadline for protest this year.

@Elissa Williams

I would just make sure that the rents would get you the cashflow you need on a 637,500 mortgage (25% down).

I would get with a lender that would close a cash-out on one of the existing properties and the duplex purchase at the same time.  If you could I would just cash-out one for now and cover any additional lending costs outside of DP with current cashflow.

If you're confident that it will rent and the numbers make sense, go for it.