All Forum Posts by: Peter Tverdov

We manage many 100+ year old buildings. The odds of you having any insulation value above R2 are very slim. Most of those buildings the studs have brick in between or nothing. That's your insulation. Then we can talk about windows as well if they're old. Your boiler will be working hard to keep the place warm, just is what it is. 

That's a big roll of the dice IMO (and I love that place).

You need to learn to draw a line in the sand or certain people will walk all over you. I don't know what residents are thinking sometimes but I don't think they realize owners pay a mortgage and maintenance. We had a tenant this past summer move into one of the nicest places we manage that's expensive rent and they put in 17 maintenance requests in 2 weeks. We absolutely ripped them and told them they're welcome to leave. 

It's a 2 way street guys. Often times we get calls from slumlords who don't want to spend a nickel but want someone else to take the bullets from the town and tenants. No thanks.

If you have a good unit that's updated and you're not a micromanager you'll find a great company, they're out there. If you own a slum or a property with Home Depot discount special all over the place then you are going to get what you pay for, just like anything else in life.

Quote from @Andrew S.:

Quote from @Peter Tverdov:

As property managers, we like to blow out all the dryer vents of properties we manage every 2 years. I actually just posted a reel on our Instagram where there were 2 birds nests in a bath vent fan in one of the properties we manage. Owners gnash their teeth when they see the dryer vent charge (OMG Pete that is a waste of money it's not a hotel!) but this thread is the reason we try to do it. It's also why we made that reel, now we can show them why we do this.

Last time I think we found 2-3 birds nests in them. Just crazy but if you don't have them covered properly that is what will happen.

 If you have birds nesting in your dryer vents, then that is on YOU, the PM, not the tenant or even the owner.  In all but the most unusual cases, a simple visual check will tell you whether the vent is properly terminated/capped, so I would expect my PM to be on top of that.

As far as cleaning the vents, I agree, they should be cleaned every few years.  Lint buildup will depend to some extent on how much/haeavy use they get and I have personally recovered frighteningly large quantities of lint from vents that may have never been cleaned in 50 years.  However, annual cleaning is not needed in my experience and is only advocated by the vent cleaning companies.

You are the textbook type of client we pass on. Completely out of touch with reality. 

8-12% a year AFTER you have made upgrades. If we gut renovate places for ourselves or clients, we budget 2-5% depending on how thorough we were. If we also replaced mechanicals, roofing, siding, windows then that number is 2%. 

First mistake is hiring a realtor to do it. Most don't have a clue and get you some crummy report that all the other realtors use.

We personally spend a few thousand dollars on advertising each month for the entire portfolio of properties we manage. Sometimes it still doesn't move quickly but usually we fill them fast as long as the owner lets us choose the rental amount (we are the experts after all). 

This is why I stopped using this forum. Tone deaf posters everywhere. 

What does your PM agreement say? The PM is at least partially right. Renewals are much harder than you think when you have volume. We reach out 90 days prior to lease expiration to offer renewal to the tenant.

I seriously doubt you are getting 8% on multi family construction when the US prime rate is 8.5% right now and most banks are prime +50-200 bps.

If you are, take it and run.