All Forum Posts by: Will Kenner

Looking for online rent collection recommendations for commercial properties. I've been using Cozy but they are no longer supporting commercial as of this month. I am only collecting commercial rent from 3 tenants so hoping to find a solution that doesn't cost me a significant monthly charge. 

@Andrew S. Mostly for "after the fact" scenarios. As mentioned before, periodically checking the grounds for the landscaper, if there's an alarm with the STR we can visually check if there's anyone there or if it's a false alarm, things of that sort. That's what I've done with my commercial property. Basically when I show up Monday morning and see there was damage done over the weekend, I go back to the video and isolate the footage.

@Luciano A. That sounds like a great system, very practical while eliminating trips for showings.

@Karl B. I do have an NVR system, actually Hikvision, for my commercial property that was professionally installed. It is a great system and have caught vandalism and transients on the property and forwarded it to police. The one down side that I've found is a poor remote access platform. The mobile app never seems to connect or connects poorly and if I am away from my main computer that's connected to the NVR, I have to remote into that computer then access the software. With your system are you able to easily access footage from your phone or remote computer directly from the NVR? We do have a static IP and 1gig fiber to that property.

For the residential needs, one property is a tri-plex and the other is a SF/STR property. I think the Hikvision would be overkill for those properties and that's why I was thinking of something that might be self install.

Thanks @Scott M. That's good to know about SimpliSafe and ease of installation. I did have ADT for my home years ago and yes, it is spendy and always required a tech should the system need attention. 

Looking for recommendations on the best way to setup remote security for rental properties. Currently for my primary residence I have a Ring system which works well and provides the basic surveillance that I'd like to have for rental properties; perimeter motion lights with cameras to record parking lot and back alley activities, "check in" on the grounds to ensure the landscapers are actually showing up, no one has graffitied the fence, determine false alarms on a vacant property, etc. Of course, all the video capture and position of the cameras will be compliant with tenant privacy and would be outward facing. 

To setup such systems for multiple properties, can this easily be done with the current DIY home systems? Each property would need dedicated internet and a network, which is an added utility cost but worth it for security and not too difficult to setup. However I'm curious if it gets complicated having multiple different accounts (i.e Ring, Nest, SimplySafe account for each property) and accessing each property on your phone? Any creative solutions and/or pitfalls that people have had? 
  

@Ronald Rohde Understood, thanks for the explanation!

@Bonnie Griffin Kaake Are you saying that most of the time lease-backs are on the market because the seller received incorrect information from their advisors? 

@Ronald Rohde That's true about the lease most likely being optimized for the seller, therefore allowing the tenant to maintain control through a lease they have "stacked in their favor". Could you clarify what you mean when you said "A lot of sellers think that the RE is "overpriced"....."  

@Andrew Tripp That's valuable advice to get the principals to personally guarantee the lease, as well as thoroughly scour the seller's/business owner's financials for indications on the health of the business. Turn-over is definitely a force to be reckoned with and an important consideration in the stress testing, thanks for pointing that out. If the building is highly customized for that one particular use of the existing business, if they pull out, it's imperative to know what it will take to reconfigure the building (if it's even possible) to be attractive to as many potential new tenants as possible.