All Forum Posts by: Kimberly T.

You are allowed to discriminate based on an applicant's job (at least I've never heard of a place that has a law about that).  Place of employment or type of work is not a protected class anywhere that I've heard.  For example, some landlords refuse to rent to lawyers.

Diagonal cracks like that are shear cracks.  What you need to determine is what is causing the shear crack.  It could be thermal expansion/contraction (as explained in the link provided by Bill Forrest), differential settlement and/or expansive soils, significant wind or seismic loading on the structure, etc.  As others above mentioned, you'll want to investigate the interior to see if there are cracks in drywall/plaster, doors and/or windows that don't open/close properly, uneven floors, etc.  I'm a structural engineer, but I'm not very familiar with brick construction (we don't really do that in CA), and I can't see what the rest of the building is framed with, so I'm just providing some basic points that I can think of based on my knowledge of masonry.  If you're unsure what's going on with the building, you can hire an engineer to come take a look and provide you a report based on his/her findings.

I agree with Marcia, it's best to provide a professional reply to a question.

For the record, "discrimination" in and of itself is not illegal.  Only discrimination against protected classes is illegal.  You can discriminate based on income (though not source of income, at least in some states), credit, pets, tattoos, etc.

If our tenants don't pay by the 5th, they get a Notice to Pay or Quit on the 6th, regardless of whether or not they let us know they'll be paying late.  Delaying serving that notice only delays when you can start the eviction process.  Serving the notice doesn't mean you have to evict them, but it gets the ball rolling on that tedious process in case they flake out and don't end up paying.

We don't own rentals in Ohio, but we advertise on Craigslist and Postlets.  Postlets is great because it posts to lots of popular sites (zillow, trulia, etc.) for you, so you just manage the one ad on Postlets instead of lots of ads on lots of sites.  And it's free!

You need to look into your state and local laws about this. In CA, if a tenant wants to run a daycare in a SFH, the landlord must allow it, but I think the landlord is allowed to require the tenant to get adequate insurance (this does not apply to a unit in a multifamily, according to what I've read). We only have multifamily rentals, so we would not allow it, due to the increased wear and tear, and the liability.

At a minimum, if you decide to allow it, make sure you require them to get insurance.

Our minimum credit score is 600, and we require at least 3x rent for income.  As others said, it will depend on your class of rentals, but for ours, a 600 score is a good cut off for us.

I'm probably gonna sound really old saying this, but.... pencil and paper.  And I'm only 30 years old (well, I'll be 31 soon).

To be honest, this answer comes with an asterisk.  That being, we own a local triplex that we manage, plus 3 fourplexes in other states that we have PMs manage (they use software for their management).  For the triplex, we have a slip of paper on the fridge where I record when each of our triplex tenants pays rent.  Any receipts related to the triplex go in a drawer.  I record everything (income, expenses, deposits withheld, etc.) on a piece of paper (with, yes, a pencil), and I bring that paper to our accountant at tax time.  I do similar for our fourplexes - I tally up income, expenses, management fees, etc. and take that to our accountant.

Honestly, this is how my parents taught me to do it because it's how they do it (they're old fashioned).  Someday I may break down and create an Excel spreadsheet for all the little categories and input it all that way, but for now, pencil and paper is faster for me.

I do have some Excel spreadsheets set up for household budget, income and expense estimates, etc., but those are just for things that determine how much money goes into each account (one account for monthly expenses, one account for less-frequent expenses, savings account, etc.).

Do I win something for being the most old school? :)

That's what I was thinking.  If they don't have insurance, then you'll probably have to pay for it yourself.  Depending on your insurance deductible for your rental, it's probably not worth it to file a claim with your insurance.

All the rentals we've bought had existing tenants (to be fair, we've only bought multifamily units, so that's typically how it goes).  To answer your questions:

- How do you do renovation work with tenants living there? - - Depends on the type of work.  We've done exterior reno work (paint, landscaping, etc.) with tenants there, but haven't done much, if any, interior reno work.  If they're problem tenants (pay rent late, trash the unit, are very dirty, etc.), you don't want to do interior reno work anyway, because they won't take care of it or appreciate it.

- What if I don't like the tenants but like the property? I'm assuming you can not evict tenants based on new ownership. - - No, you can't evict for that reason.  If they are month-to-month, and it isn't under rent control, you can probably serve them a notice of termination of tenancy to make them leave, though (but check your state/local laws about that).  If they are on a lease, you have to wait until their lease is up. Or you could offer them cash for keys and see if they take it.  You inherit the lease with the property, so you definitely want to read through it during escrow.

- How can I raise the rent once I buy it if I feel it is too low? - - If the tenant is month to month, you can follow state/local laws regarding rent increases.  If they are on a lease, you have to wait until the lease is up.

I'd recommend you read about your state/local landlord tenant laws to see what your rights and responsibilities are.  Good luck.