All Forum Posts by: Lori Williams

I use it only to advertise a property and take initial applications. I require a Zillow application or for the person to send me their information on how many adults and children will occupy the property, household income and sources and how long they've been at their job.

If they won't send me that information through Zillow, then I conclude they don't want the property bad enough. I get too many applications and I don't have time to walk everyone through so I limit it only to applications

It's an excellent screening tool, and it gets really good results for me as far as people seeing the ad. I usually have 8 to 10 applications within the first day or two

I have not tried any of their other tools. I have my own application that is filled out after the Zillow one, and I have my own lease which I have them print out or sign electronically.

So if you charge a security and last month, you have to give them a free first month?

You could divide one month of rent by 11 and tack it onto each month of the first 11 months of their rental year, and give them the 12th month free for each year all their payments are on time. So you are technically getting their "last month" in advance of the last month (unless they don't fulfill their 12 month lease). If they don't pay their last month like they are supposed to, you can take it out of their deposit, and you still have the extra money each of the months they did pay. Basically, you can get all 3, and give them the same "net rent", just formatted differently.

We're going to see gas go up more, the fed is going to raise interest rates, home buying will slow but there will still be a demand for rentals. However, rents have increased more than wages, which means we'll be seeing young ppl live with their parents longer rather than renting or buying. 

Investors need to buy smart - buy for today, but be able to pivot if conditions and situations change (make sure you have enough room to lower your rents if you need to and still make your profits, don't over leverage). If you have enough rentals, maybe sitting back and watching until things get more stabile is a good idea. If you're a flipper, maybe getting a few rentals is a good idea.  The key is to (always) buy  with the worst case in mind, so if things go south for a while with the economy, etc, you're still in a position of having income, even if it's decreased somewhat.

Remember, when housing goes bust, more ppl need to rent. So IF the housing market were to worst case on us, the need for rentals will remain. 

Right now I don't think I'd be doing much building, but rather focus on existing properties. Take less risks, negotiate a little more conservatively.

The money should never be paid until they are physically out of the building - even if that's just sitting in a loaded moving truck in the driveway - that way they can't get back in.

If they did half of what you asked, you pay them half the money.

So if cleaning was one thing and moving out was the other, I would give them half the 500.00

I have never had a tenant leave the property clean, even though I always tell them that it was move in clean when they got there (or in once case I paid them to clean after they moved in bc they moved in the day after the others left), and it needs to be move in clean when they leave. Never. So I always plan on spending 2 days cleaning and touching up at a minimum. I've had a couple where a week+ was needed.

You guys can find the comps on your own if you feel you're qualified to do that and make it fair for both of you.

You could pay 3 realtors to do reports using comps and average them out.

You could do both and come to some price based on combination of the two.

I'm guessing with a short term rental, you're paying the utilities. More ppl = more utilities.

Did you give them a break off your nightly rate for their longer term rate?

How many people do you normally allow to stay in the house?

I would also be concerned with the liability, and would probably ask them to obtain a renter's policy that covered their guests and any damage to the property or any liability. I would have the guests sign a waiver of liability.

And I would tell them that each guest needed to pay $15.00/night to cover the increased utilities, because your price was based on the number of ppl on the lease.

So basically, it would cost them probably 20.00/mo for a renters policy and 15.00/night for increased utilities.

You have every right to expect tenants not to cause an unnecessary repair, whether it's $30.00, $300.00 or $3k. It's not about whether you're broke, but whether you should have to dump money into something that should never have been broken.

All but one of my rentals have the tenants paying their own utilities. The only one that doesn't has them pay everything but water and trash (it's the same bill). In that lease, I tell them I pay the first 140.00/mo, and anything over that, they must split, based on the number of people in the household (so if there are 3 in one unit and 4 in the other, one tenant will pay 3/7 of the overage, and one tenant will pay 4/7 of the overage). I do this to try to motivate them to not be ridiculous with water use (like letting the water run to brush your teeth or when you wash dishes, or take long showers that empty the hot water tank, etc)

In all my leases, I have a clause that says all appliances on the property are left as a curtesy, and if they break, either the tenant needs to fix them or buy their own. Hoping to motivate them to take care of the appliances. 

And in all my leases, I have a clause about repairs, and the tenant must pay for any repairs/service that is a result of their actions (like if they clog the toilet w/ too much tp, clog the shower drain because they didn't trap the hair, or... screw up the central a/c bc they were running it in colder weather)

It's unfortunate, but many renters, whether they are low income or high income, feel perfectly OK with abusing the house because they aren't paying for it. I try to head that off by making them responsible if they abuse the house.

 That is exactly how I feel about out of state investors in Youngstown. Some are OK, but there are far too many who buy distressed, slap some paint on it, and toss a bad tenant into it and suck all the life out of the property and doing nothing to make their neighborhood better (in fact, they often make the neighborhoods worse). They look at the properties as "disposable" bc they can buy in cheap, rehab cheap.

As investors, we should *all* make our properties nicer because it's the right thing to do. But caring about the neighborhood you're buying in and wanting it to appreciate is simply good business, and in high rental communities, if *all* the investors just did that little bit extra, it would make a world of difference in so many ways.

Congratulations :)