All Forum Posts by: Kimberly T.

My score has continued to rise, and we now own 5 properties, all with loans.  I've never paid anything late in my life, so I've never had anything bad on my report.  My scores lately have been upper 700s.  Haven't broken through 800 yet, I was told it's because I'm still too young (30), but I don't actually know for sure.  As long as it still puts me in the "excellent" category, that's what I care about.

I agree with the comments about finding out who the executor is before letting anyone in the unit.  The last thing you want to do is let the daughter in to retrieve some things, then get sued later on by some other relative because your tenant's will left that person some valuable heirlooms that have "mysteriously vanished" since the daughter was there.  Do some research on your state and local laws about this, and like Joel said, maybe you can skim a few minutes of free info from an eviction attorney (if not, it's probably worth it to pay an attorney for advice).

I agree with@Frank Jiang, this article is about income/earning power, not wealth, so it's kind of... pointless, to me anyway.  I'm an engineer, but my husband and I have been investing in RE for years to provide cash flow so that I can quit working when we have kids.  I don't care about my earning potential as an engineer in 5-10 years from now because I don't plan on doing that full time at that point.

With that said, we've done very well for ourselves so far, and we're still in our early 30s.  Bought our house and 4 multifamily rentals in the past 7 years and developed quite a bit of equity and good cash flow.  So, while our total income will be lower at age 35 than it is now (since I won't be working by then), we'll be doing just fine, because that was our goal all along.

I wasn't thinking about the w/d in my original post.  We never include a w/d in our units that have hook ups.  We have some units in a building we just bought that came with w/d, and we plan to get rid of those machines when the tenants vacate.  The fewer appliances you supply (and thus have to maintain), the better for your bottom line!

Does the unit include a garage?  If they want to bring in their own appliances, they are responsible for storing your appliances that they aren't using.  If you're ok with it, they could put them in the garage, or put them in storage (tenant should pay for storage costs, not you).  Make sure you get a big enough security deposit to buy all new appliances if they decide to abscond with them upon move-out later on.

Thanks everyone, I'll be doing some more research into this.

I realize the tenant can still flip the circuit breaker, but I'm trying to prevent the "Ooops, I went out of town and forgot to leave the heater on" type of scenario.  Seems like most burst pipes are caused by ignorance/negligence rather than a willful flipping of a breaker by a tenant.

Brent, there are lots of companies that cover landlords.  I recommend looking up some local insurance brokers, they will have access to lots of companies, rather than you trying to call a bunch of companies all on your own.  I typically call 3-6 brokers when shopping for insurance.

Forgot to mention about umbrellas, we are just getting umbrellas for ourselves now.  We have a personal umbrella and are also getting a commercial umbrella.  My understanding is, the personal covers liability related to our personal property (cars, home, etc.), so if we cause a major car accident or a bunch of people get hurt at our house, they won't try to sue us for the equity in our rentals, they'll just go after the personal umbrella.  The commercial umbrella is added liability insurance that covers our rentals over and above our basic insurance we have on them.  Rates can vary dramatically among different states regarding whether it's better to just increase your liability coverage on your rental or get an umbrella, so look into both options.

I have been told that some insurance companies don't really want to do that kind of insurance, so they jack up their premiums to make it worth their time, effort, and risk.  That might be what happened to you, but maybe not.  I definitely recommend shopping around, I have seen premiums vary dramatically between different companies (as much as 2 or 3 times the amount).

As a woman with long hair, I'll vouch for the 20+ minute shower.  I just don't know how ladies do it all in 5-10 minutes.

With that said, 30 gallons should be plenty.  We even have some 30 gallon water heaters in some 2 bedroom units.  I like your ideas of turning up the heat a little (especially if the tenant is paying for the utilities) and installing a low flow shower head.  I want to say we replaced an old water heater for a tenant a while back and then they complained about running out of hot water, and it turned out that the new one was on the lowest heat setting, so turning it up solved the problem.

 Good to know. :)  Reason #4391 why we won't be buying any more rentals in CA.