All Forum Posts by: Ryan Sauer

@Steven B. I am also from Niagara Falls. Do you have any suggestions? Thank you

Hello everyone,

I became a landlord for the first time ever on Friday. My property is a 4-plex in Welland, all units 3 bedroom, 1 bathroom and a basement. Each unit is fully rented, so I provided each tenant with a new lease agreement (in my name), additional terms (to go with the lease agreement), and a welcome letter. 

Currently I have been doing snow removal/salting myself at the property and have been documenting my kilometers. How do you go about this, documenting kilometers seems pretty 'loose' for the tax deduction. I assume hiring a snow removal contractor is tax deductible as well and just put under maintenance costs? Say I put a claim in for 1500$ for snow removal, will the full amount be deducted ? I need to find an accountant to do more digging on this tax stuff, its hard finding information on the internet.  

I got to say I am a bit stressed out with this new property, so any tips or suggestions about anything in general are greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Ryan

Hello Solomon,

I actually live in Niagara Falls and recently purchased a multi family property in Welland. 

St. Catharines and Niagara Falls are currently booming and are quite pricey compared to the surrounding Niagara Region. Welland has been growing and booming over the past couple of years, alot of developments, cheaper than NF and St. C with still rents very comparable to NF.

Fort Erie is the furthest town from Toronto, and lacks quite a bit, there honestly isnt much going on out there and it is reasonably far from the other surrounding cities. It borders the Buffalo, NY border which is attractive. There is proposals for big luxury condominium buildings to be built out that way. They have started quite a few residential home developments out this way as well. There has been rumor for years that they would be building a Nascar track on the border of Fort Erie. I do expect Fort Erie to boom in the near future, therefore I expect homes to appreciate even more here. 

Any questions, feel free to reach out.

I would start out by looking into realtors on the MLS in Sudbury who are currently selling multi properties.

Reach out to them via phone call or email and interview them. Ask them if they have there own multi properties, and/or if they specialize/ have alot of experience in these properties.

My realtor was good in a sense that he gave me his own expert advice on properties we walked through that he would buy or not buy. He pointed out the positives and negatives in his eyes. He has 50 units.

We ended up buying a great property, for a negotiated under list price offer with a brand new 22K$ roof!

Just a quick update. I was able to hassle my realtor to get my questions answered last night. My realtor then forwarded me some information via email from the selling agent, that was forwarded from the seller. I decided to email the seller some more questions directly to eliminate all headaches with the agent and he has been awesome, providing more info than I requested and more than willing to help. He even went into detail to explain how the tenants interact and there personalities etc. 

Now that this is dealt with I couldn't be more excited for the close date February 5th!

@Zorya Belanger Thank you very much for your input. I really appreciate it as this is a learning process for me.

I totally agree with the leases ! All tenants have moved into the property between 2013-2017. I will definitely make up new leases between myself and each tenant. I hate all this being disorganized, its driving me nuts, I need to just get this place and have everything organized and logged accordingly...

Yes, we did do a walk through before going firm on this property.

So the first property we went to look at with this realtor, he actually had my wife contact the selling agent to book a walkthrough time because he did not like the selling agent at all. That should have been my red flag right there... The things I did like about the realtor was that he had experience with investment properties, as he owns many and he actually gave good advice to us on what he thought was a good property and what he didnt think was good for the requested price. The quadplex we purchased with him, I do have to give him credit, that he got us a great deal on it, below list price in the highly competitive market of the Niagara Region. 

Its just so annoying to me that after we went firm, its like we are non existent to him and he does no more work for us and wont find out any info I request from the seller, all he needs to do is make one phone call or even email! Should I contact the selling agent directly or is this crossing the line? (Im new to this lol, this might be a dumb question.)

@Hai Loc  I really appreciate your input. Lets just say I will never be working with this agent ever again. I think one reason he delays asking my questions to the selling agent is because I am working with a mortgage broker that I have heard great things about but he completely despises. He actually called me and told me not to work with her, but I went ahead and worked with her anyway. Its like the deal is firm and now we are just completely ignored/forgotten about.

I really didn't want to have to contact the selling agent directly but I feel its reaching that point. I contact him to answer my questions, says he will follow through then never does and never gets back to me.

Im really hoping the rent numbers we received are accurate now too. Ill have to keep you updated. Ughh

Hello everyone,

I think it would be best for me to first introduce myself. My name is Ryan, I live in Niagara Falls, ON, Canada am 28 years old and work in Water Treatment with my local municipality. Two of my all time favorite hobbies include weight lifting and float fishing! For years now, me and my wife have always had the dream of owning rental propertie(s). So recently after finally getting over the emotional scare of making the jump and searching for properties for over 6 months we made the jump and put in an offer on a quad-plex in Niagara that after a bit of back and forth and reaching agreements, our offer got accepted. I feel this property is a great property, because its current income (although rents are way below market rent) pays the expenses of the property. The big renovation expenses have been looked at by the previous owner, such as majority new windows and a new roof(22K$) that was part of our deal. This building is really 4 townhomes in a 2x2 grid, each unit features 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, and a basement with 2 entrances. This property can use some work as the units are a bit dated. This property was inspected by a home inspector, and I plan to go through his report and fix most things. I plan to get the full exterior cleaned/fixed up and replace more major things as they come up down the road ex. furnace(s). As tenants move out in the future I will fully renovate the unit and put it up for market rent. To increase the property value, property income and therefore refinance for a greater amount.

I have a couple questions for the experienced:

We close on the property February 5th. It seems like my real estate agent has totally dropped us after he sealed the deal. He never answers any questions I request him to ask the seller. Such as about the snow removal (I would like to continue to use the same company to finish the season). Is it ok for me to go above him and contact the selling agent with my questions? I am currently getting now where with mine, and I would really like to be ready with a snow removal contractor for our possession date.

I dont know if this is only a Canadian thing, but for the rents of each unit I was given an overall Proforma that shows the year it was rented and the current rent rate. Is there a document that should provide me with information on the tenants, like there name etc?  There is no lease agreements on these units. Each tenant is currently month to month. I was thinking of filling in my own lease agreements and backdating them to there occupied date. (SO they arent bound to a year agreement and they stay month to month.

Do you have any suggestions for what I should do when I first take possession of the property? I plan on doing my property walk around, meeting the tenants and provide them with a letter of who we are and how to reach us if there is an issue with the property. Should I state in this letter how we would like to be paid and if by cheque, etc?

If anyone has any questions feel free to ask! I am super excited for this journey as I am a hard worker, enjoy learning new things and solving problems! I am super excited to be apart of the BP community!

Ryan