All Forum Posts by: Christopher Reynolds

As an owner of a house built pre-1978, I've been concerned with the costs of possible remediation. I've not had anyone under the age of 6 occupy this property yet, but considering the type of neighborhood it's in, I think it's likely inevitable.

My concern is that any amount of lead found in the property would come with a substantial cost to remediate. Am I being too paranoid? Most of the windows in the property are vinyl replacement windows, and we are replacing the old windows gradually. I suspect the walls have had 15+ coats of non-leaded paint since 1978, but I don't know how deep the test goes.

Are there any situations where lead can cost a modest amount of money to remediate, or are we facing a huge financial burden once any lead is found?

High priority for our next property: Lead Certs :)

I think a lot of the confusion between users understanding of Section 8 laws comes from each state having differing views on how Section 8 should be handled.

In Massachusetts, it is my understanding that you cannot "choose to not accept Section 8", you must qualify/disqualify the tenant just as any other tenant. I can't cite any legal cases where landlords were found liable, but this isn't what the discussion is actually about anyway. Though I am learning a lot about the certification process here. Good info from Shaun Reilly about the lead certs.

Welcome Julio! You seem like a true entrepreneur, engaging in several different ideas at once to become successful. BP is surely the right place to learn about how to be even more successful.

Good information, thank you everyone!

Ok thanks! So the new sole borrower would have to qualify for the entire balance, just as if he/she were buying the house alone?

Hey everyone. My girlfriend and I own a triplex together. We are both on the mortgage, jointly and severally responsible for payment. We were wondering if there is an easy way to make only one of us responsible for the mortgage. We'd like to acquire another property, and we wouldn't necessarily need both of our incomes to qualify, though if our current property is paid for by both of us, it might reduce our purchasing power. Is there an easy way to accomplish this? Should we just call our lender, or would it not really be possible? Thanks much!

I used SmartMove (through the BP link) on my last tenant screening, and I think I might have taken money and paid for it. In the future, I'll have the tenant pay directly, and just give me access. Even though it may seem unreasonable, it would be nice to follow the letter of the law when possible.

This oversimplification of "American vs International" investors is peculiar. Work with whoever you want to work with. Just so you know, there are plenty of American investors who really know what they are doing, and plenty of international investors that aren't great. Your post seems like you wish to instigate something, rather than help anyone or contribute in a meaningful way.

Thank you everyone! We plan to contact our agent before we look at anything outside of her area, as we'd love to work with her. If she's willing to work with us, we wouldn't need her to be there for us to look at it initially, we can evaluate the property ourselves. If she can work with us, could I tell the sellers agent that we have representation, but she is unavailable and we request seeing the property without her? Not sure what needs to happen regarding commission splitting and such. I wasn't sure if our agent needed to be there for the first meeting or anything. Thanks again!

Hi everyone. We are in the process of searching for an investment property. We are currently working with an exceptional buyer's agent. Her office services a certain area that is relatively close to us. We have been looking at properties with her, and have placed a few offers, nothing accepted yet.

We have recently thought about changing our plan, and looking at different types of properties. The type of property we would be looking at requires us to search in a different area of the state, a couple hours away from her normal area. We have found a few properties we'd love to look at, and one of them we feel we need to see right away.

How do we proceed? We'd love to continue working with her if possible. Could we view the properties with the listing agent, and then call our buyer's agent later and ask if she'd be willing to work with us on a transaction out of her area as a one-time occurrence? Do we need to see the property with a buyer's agent in that area?

Thanks for any help!