All Forum Posts by: Seth Phillips

@William Collins. Congrats William!! I am just doing the same thing today!!!! I bought three properties in Rumford and Mexico Maine 2 years ago, today I close on the sale of a property in old orchard beach Maine. I am also doing a 1031 exchange although my net earnings are not quite as eye watering and juicy as yours I am excited to be moving up in equity and stability!!!!

@Jonathan Plant

Me. Plant hitting the mail on the head!!! Collect cash from the unit so you can do inspections to check up on your investment!’r

To the original post

I don’t see what the problem is with accepting cash??????

What’s inconvenient about it??

I have a question for you. Do you own any stocks? If so, how often do you check on the price of your stocks? If the answer is more than once a month that makes sense.

So if you’re willing to check on a stock worth a couple hundred dollars on up to a couple thousand dollars more than once a month, don’t you think you should check on your property that’s worth several hundred thousand dollars at least once a month...

So that being said it’s not inconvenient to accept cash because it puts you in front of your property.

Collect the cash, put it in your bank account and have a great day! It’s that easy, if it’s not enough cash give them a signed receipt of amount payed with amount owed and then proceed with the necessary legal action if you can’t work anything out. You can get receipt books on Amazon, or any office supply store.

I get that the online stuff is wicked convenient, but you should never complain about getting paid. Collect your cash and have a happy day, especially if getting paid in cash is your biggest complaint :). Best of luck!

@Trent Werner

I had several properties where the tenants stopped paying rent. Maine has a rental assistance program however the tenant has to fill it out and sign it. So if the tenant wants to be difficult they have all the power to do so.

That being said I bought these properties in low income areas so the properties themselves weren’t terribly expensive. So I was able to pay the mortgages out of savings and partial rent. Additionally I have most of these tenants on month to month rental agreements. So although you can not evict for non payment of rent you can evict with a no cause eviction. Take your time and do it right. Hire a lawyer give the tenant a non renewal of lease notice. Then give them the proper notice to quit for a no cause eviction which is 45 days in Maine. The whole process takes right around three months and then I regained my property. There is high demand for housing right now in Maine so I was able to fill it quickly with tenants who pay and aren’t trouble makers.

I also don’t want people to think I’m an awful person, they all had jobs and bragged about how they were making more money then me and there was nothing I could do to get rid of them. Don’t let the bad ones keep you down. It’s a tunnel not a hole. It’s your property at the end of the day and you have rights too!

So that was my experience, very stressful. Oh and to be clear I tried everything before the eviction, asking them to leave, offering them money to leave, offering them a lot of money to leave, then I got the lawyer involved haha.

Hey guys, I would be happy to show you how to set up an LLC on your own. I set my LLC up myself through the state directly, it was very easy and inexpensive. However I am a sole member so if you have multiple members banks etc... it may be better do do things differently. Just thought I would throw that out there. just realized I am probably way to late lol.

Braden,

Your goals are YOUR goals at the end of the day.  To be frank with you, I think the most important thing for you to do is determine what those goals really are.  It seems you have some kind of plan which is great!!! So if you just want to have a nicer home in the future and raise some kids I think you would honestly be very safe in what you have.  Depending on the state of the property I would honestly leave the kitchens and bathrooms alone as long as everything works and doesn't look "busted".  In my humble opinion the best thing you can do to appreciate value in the home is floors and paint.  they aren't terribly expensive or difficult to do.  this means you can save on both materials and labor!!  

Additionally I heard you mention a garage.  I don't know LA code, but I think with your equity something to look into would be a garage remodel to make it a livable separate apartment.  Maybe keep the garage and build above it, turn the garage itself in to a unit etc... 

Or, you could take the much riskier position of selling the property to realize the equity and move to a slightly more recessed area and buy a multifamily property with an FHA loan, 4 units or less, and then take the rest and buy another multifamily with a purchase plus improvements loan. essentially your equity would stay the same or potentially dip down with this move. However your cash flow would easily move in to the positive and with time most real estate will go up.
 

I am on the other side of the country in Maine, so I could be very very wrong about everything I just said for your area.  This was just some advice from someone with similar goals.  I own 4 properties now, soon to be 3 (closing on a sale this month,) and am looking to grow my portfolio so that I can have all my rentals pay for my single family home that I some day purchase.  

Hope that gave you some potential ideas to work with.  

I would recommend investing in the stock market high dividend monthly payouts. QYLD, thats the ticker, also a tad riskier but higher overall potential return, VOD, and BTI!. get that amount you have saved up to 10k and you are in business. Unless you are a veteran, then there are some options for you. at 10k you could look in to properties just under 300k with an FHA loan as long as they are 4 units or less! thats just my advice. Just remember the market isn't hot everywhere, so there are still deals out there but I think realistically 2500 might be a little too low to start with for fixer uppers. I started with about 40k that took me years to save up for.