All Forum Posts by: Kyle Meyers

I am not a tax adviser, and you should ask someone who is, but here is my understanding.

If it is for business, you can usually deduct it.

Meals: if it is you and your real estate agent, attorney, title agent, insurance agent, property manager, etc. and you are discussing your investing, it is probably deductible. If it is you and your spouse or date and you mention you invest in real estate, you can't deduct it.

Mileage: This is a tricky one. You cannot deduct a commute, so if you don't have a home office and you drive from home to your property, you can't deduct it, but if you have a home office you could. As for searching for a property to buy, you can add it to the cost of the property once you close and then depreciate over 27.5 years for residential real estate. I am unsure of how you would deduct the mileage for investigating or searching for a property which you do not purchase.

Cell Phone: You can deduct the percentage of your bill which is attributable to business calls.

Again, this is just my understanding so you should talk to your tax adviser to get better answers which you can rely on.

Student rentals are different than a normal residential rental. You will probably be getting parents to co-sign for all the residents. You will need to learn how the rental market works there. At Indiana University, November is the start of the leasing season and most units have signed leases by January or February for the following August. The leases are usually just under 1 year, running from mid-August through July, this gives the management some time to repair the units between tenants. Here, the units are unfurnished and tenant usually pay all utilities (landlord pays water on multifamily). You will have to check out what the market is like in your area because all of the things I just mentioned vary greatly. The pros for student rentals are that you usually have very creditworthy cosigners, you can get large security deposits, vacancy tends to be lower, and the rent usually comes on time. The cons: students can be very hard on the property, if you don't get it leased by August, you will probably have a full year of vacancy.

I would recommend you read the property management for dummies book to get a basic idea of what is involved in managing your properties. If you decide to move forward, I believe it is essential you have the NOLO legal guide and tax deduction guide for landlords, they will prove extremely useful. And of course, this site is one of the best resources for most of your questions.

So far, my tenants have not mounted any tvs on the walls. If they do, I would charge for any necessary repairs to the walls once they move out, if they are causing damage to the studs, charge them for the repair. You could probably make it a term in your lease that if they install a tv mount, there will be a $XXX.XX charge.

I agree that you don't want your tenant to blame you and your tv mount when their tv falls.

I recently discussed this with my attorney and was told that giving the notice to the tenant or sending it via certified mail are both acceptable ways to serve the tenant with the notice to quit for failure or refusal to pay rent IC 32-31-1-7.

Depending on the small claims court you are in, they may not even check if you served the notice or may count the notice the court sends to a tenant for the eviction hearing as the 10 day notice. The 10 day notice is still legally required though.

I also asked about whether the 10 days to pay are calendar days or business days, and while it is not clear in the statute, we determined it is most likely calendar days and there is legal precedent for the 45 days for return of a security deposit being calendar days.

Disclaimer: I am not an attorney, and I may not have gotten the above info correct from my discussion with my attorney, so don't take this as legal advise or rely on it.

I got a policy from Farmers for a duplex that was in pretty bad shape and I couldn't get a policy on from some other insurers. I don't know if they would do a policy for a place with fire damage, but it's worth a shot.

Yes, quiet title will add to your cost. I am buying liens on properties I would like to hold as rentals, so I am not going to quiet the title since I don't plan to sell soon. When I want to sell I will have to quiet the title or find a title insurance company which will write a title policy without the quiet title action being completed.

Sorry for the confusion. When I first posted I had not yet had an opportunity to review all of my costs and just put a ballpark estimate. I have looked at my actual costs now and my total investment in this lien is a little under $1K.

My attorney does the required notifications and petitions the court for the tax deed for $450. I spoke to several attorneys and this is a pretty standard charge for the services because it is based on the amount which the courts have set as a limit on how much can be added to the lien, which an owner will have to repay to redeem.

You are correct that subsequent taxes and government liens will have to be paid to get the tax deed. I have paid the subsequent taxes, which were very low for this particular property. This property did not have any additional city or county liens on it. I have seen weed mowing liens and nuisance liens on other tax liens, the additional charges are usually no more than a few hundred dollars. There are risks of additional liens, but that comes with this kind of investing. I try to buy liens at an amount low enough that even if there are additional liens added to the property, the value will still be high enough to ensure a good return.

I should be able to insure it, though I agree the newly acquired properties clause probably doesn't cover it. A lien on real estate is an insurable interest, I would just have to find a company that will write a policy on the lien.

As for your question about the margin, my investment is probably about $1K and that includes the lien purchase price, subsequent taxes, and attorney fees. Most other liens would be wiped out by a tax deed and I would own the property free and clear for what I have invested now. There would be costs associated with any repairs needed and if I were to sell with a broker I would have to pay their commission, but that should cover all the costs.

Imfuna Rent is an app that guides you through a move in/move out inspection with comments and pictures of every aspect of a unit. I have used it for 2 move in inspections and it works great. And its Free!

Looks like a good deal. I have a duplex with similar rents and about the same all-in investment. Difference is just I bought mine cheaper and put more into the rehab. Make sure you do your due diligence on how much your rents and expenses will really be, if they estimates you have are right, you have yourself a buy.