All Forum Posts by: Rex Petersen

Hi Javonn, is it zones as R2 and you'll need to get a use-variance to use the lot as R3 with 3 units?  With all that land and room for parking, why not even add a 4th unit even further maximize the rent potential?  That's a lot of land, how far is it from downtown?  Do you have an architect or you'd need that as well?   How big are the current duplex units?  To me is seems like 3bed/2bath is a nice sweet spot for some areas of Pittsburgh where people are looking for an extra bedroom/office for work-from-home.

The actual Tesla headquarters move toAustin seems like more news and hype than an actual big change as Tesla was already building in Austin.  But I wouldn't want to underestimate the power of a big news-generating company like Tesla announcing the CA->TX move as it feeds into the headlines and momentum of Austin as the new up-and-coming tech center in the minds of many news-watchers out there and will make decisions over the years to come of where they want to be/move to be part of the action of the future.  Each decision made to move to a new growing place adds up to a big overall impact in demand/prices and growing market.

This sounds bad.  People make big money decisions based on what the rules are TODAY, and changing that seems very unfair.  Typically big changes like this get some kind of grandfather clause so it only effects money decisions starting after it passes.  At least the deadline is out at end of 2023, but still for someone who made a big decision to buy and hold, it seems unfair to make them sell the property.

In Pittsburgh and Austin, the online county records show the owner of each property. I ran into one owned by an LLC I had to do a little more digging to track down the owner. But I just closed this week on two properties I tracked down the owner based on county records and made them an offer.

I'd pay the first round of treatments, while informing them (and have in lease) that they will be responsible for future costs of pests as motivation to keep the place clean.

@Michael 

@Michael Greenfield the meetup is this Wednesday, Oct 13th at 6pm @ Cupkas on the Southside.  Contact @Matt Dingus who organizes this event and can send you and invite to RSVP.

Welcome Michael!  Start by coming to our Bigger Pockets meetup in Pittsburgh next Wednesday Oct 13th, it's a great place to network and learn the local market.  And to ask EVERYONE for referrals when you are looking for a good realtor, accountant, contractor, plumber, etc.  My best contacts come that way.

Hi Jonathan, Yes you can use and FHA, and it's a great way to house-hack if you can find a triplex or quad that works for you since you only have to have the crazy-low 3.5% down. Since you can only do one FHA at a time like Riley mentioned, you might as well use that one bullet on a big investment to make the 3.5% go as far as you can.

Hi Andrew, don't be afraid of starting a new Meetup group.   A rookie Matt did this in Pittsburgh and we all love it, it is well attended, he has rotated in some great topics and speakers, and he's new to all of this and just eager to learn like many others.  He just had the guts and was willing to be the organizer.

Ok Joe, tell us your secret to keeping a renter happy for 16 years! (and it better not be that you never raised the rent in all that time :)