All Forum Posts by: Michael D.

I've worked part-time with Virtual Realty Group (I'm also in Massachusetts) for the past 1 1/2 years.  I've had a great experience and I was a new agent.  They have a learn as you go mentality as far as training goes so I feel you need to be a bit more self-motivated starting out as opposed to if you worked for a more well-known brokerage with a more formal training program.  Let me know if you have any questions. 

Thank you everyone for all of this very helpful information. Working on getting an estoppel agreement signed by the seller and tenants. Another wrinkle was discovered today. Apparently one of the tenants is moving out at the end of this month. I just found this out today.. apparently the listing agent was unsure of that until today. Has anyone ever had new tenants come in during the sale process? There has been no P&S signed yet. But the sellers are sending an application from a tenant for me to review along with her credit check. This tenant is the sister of the current tenant. Both live there now but don’t think she was on the lease. I can understand wanting to fill the unit in the event I don’t move forward with the purchase. But who ultimately gets to decide on a tenant while the property is in transition? Kinda a weird scenario.

I was quoted yesterday on my 3 family property that the annual property insurance would increase from $2,100 annually to $3,600 annually if I wanted to be able to rent to an inherited tenant with a pitbull.  Something to consider.. is it worth the additional cost and potential liability to you?

Thanks Josane,

I'm leery of the landlord-tenant laws in MA as well as MA is heavily oriented towards being a non landlord-friendly state.  I am going to ask for copies of the original leases signed by these tenants and ask for proof of history of payment.  I'm planning to self-manage it initially, but then ultimately may end up turning it over to a property manager.  I appreciate your feedback!

Good morning,

I am a newly licensed Massachusetts Realtor and I've done some single family flips years ago.  I am currently under contract to purchase my first multi-family buy & hold property in Western Massachusetts.  It's mostly renovated and updated with newer mechanicals and major items taken care of.  The first 2 floors are occupied with month to month tenants, and the 3rd floor is renovated and vacant, ready to be rented out to my own tenants once I obtain title.

Purchase price is going to be $201,000 and gross annual income should be around 31-33k or so.

What I am very nervous about going into this is inheriting tenants and screening tenants.  I am afraid of getting burned as I have heard many horror stories of inheriting tenants, and given that I'm new to this, afraid I am going to miss something since I don't know what I'm doing.

It was discovered that the 2nd floor tenant has a pitbull puppy living on the premises during my showing at the property.  I put an extension on my offer for the property and asked that the sellers have the tenant remove the puppy.  I felt bad doing it, but I can't get homeowner's insurance with a pitbull living there.  The listing agent has stated that the tenant wants to stay, and the dog will be removed by tomorrow.  My concern is that now I'm potentially inheriting a tenant that is not going to be happy with me from the start.  Would you do any screening on tenants that you're inheriting, even if they are month to month and have already been screened by current owners?  I keep thinking to myself, "what's stopping this guy from just bringing the dog back in a few weeks..."

The first floor tenants are sisters, and one of them is moving out soon.  The other sister wants to move in and have the apt under her name.  She is "assuming" she's moving in.  I still will screen her and do a full background check.  

Do you normally have tenants sign new leases with you when you inherit them?  If they're already month to month should I try to just keep it as a month to month lease or would you try to get them into a 1 year lease?  Has anyone inherited tenants and just honored an existing month to month agreement without having them sign anything new or additional?  

I'm so new to this that I feel like I'm at the point where I don't know what I don't know.  Any insight is appreciated!

Hello everyone, I am a fairly newly licensed MA Realtor and am about to purchase my first multi-family property in Western Massachusetts. I’ve done some flips in the past that I’ve lived in and resold years later, but this will be my first multi family property to rent out, and I’ll be buying it cash. Without it being financed, I have some additional concerns over keeping things anonymous and ensuring that an LLC is set up properly for protection. A local real estate attorney has quoted me $1,000 to establish an LLC, in addition to the MA filing fee. Any thoughts on going this route versus just establishing the LLC on Legalzoom for half the cost? I just want to make sure that with Legalzoom I wouldn’t be missing out on something that the attorney would’ve otherwise done in setting it up. Thanks in advance for any input!