All Forum Posts by: Mike Watts

Joey Ickes I heard a great "quick tip" on one of the podcasts that suggested to go to Home Depot or Lowe's at 7am in an area near your properties to find good contractors. The thought being these are the guys who are working hard for their business and already operating close by. Houston is a big city and not many contractors work all areas. Early bird gets the worker I guess...good luck!!

Thanks everyone for the great feedback! Heading to THD to take a closer look at the choices once again then over to the properties to meet with contractors. I'll post pics here once we get the work completed.

I'm leaning toward the vinyl wood in the living areas/kitchens and carpet in the bedrooms. In the past I've used tile and still think that's the cheapest way to go in the long term, but I do like the look of wood floors and think it helps me attract better tenants.

I have two remodels starting in the next week and have been getting mixed advice on the best flooring to install. One is a SFR (2000 ft2) and the other is a duplex (2100ft2)bin the Houston suburban market. Both need new floors throughout. I know everyone has differing options and preferences so: What is your go-to flooring choice these days given cost, look, durability, and ease of install? Opinions on: Vinyl Wood? Carpet in bedrooms? Tile? Laminate? Thanks for your input!!

Kevin - Thank you for the post! You are absolutely right - I was mistaken on the number of piers. The house needs 38 piles (30 exterior and 8 interior) for a total price of $5,130. I will look into getting the engineers report regarding the plumbing to help me make the final call.

Michael - Thank you for you post as well! It's certainly a good reminder to consider all exit strategies and I suppose my question would be whether to invest the money on a foundation repair now or just fix cosmetics and put it up for lease. Fortunately, I am picking up the property at a strong discount which should leave most options profitible in the long term. My bank doesn't do interior inspections for the portfolio loans so really I would be out the $5k without any additional return in the shorter term and suppose I could always repair the foundation later if I need to sell to a traditional financed buyer.

I have a 1998 build 2300 ft2 single story SFR south of Houston with some foundation issues that we will be closing this week as a buy/hold rental. We received bids from three companies to repair the foundation who all said the house has about 2-3" of settling across the length of the slab and would require 70-80 piers including some interior piers to fully repair the foundation. There are some cracks in the sheetrock in two bedrooms but in most of the home the slope in unnoticeable and has not affected the finish. I own several rental properties in this area but this is my first experience with this type of repair and am tempted to just fix the sheetrock and hope that the house is done settling. Should I bite the bullet and pay the $6k-$7k for the work or patch and hope for the best?

This is also my first post to the forum and I am honored to be part of this amazing community. I have listened to nearly all of the podcasts and find the information here to be unmatched. Thanks to Josh and Brandon for creating such a worthwhile site and thanks to everyone in the community for the open and selfless advice.