All Forum Posts by: Steven J.

I'm hitting the ground running this year with amped up marketing for mobile homes. Currently, I'm looking for mobile homes around the Champaign Urbana area, Bloomington, Decatur, Springfield, Mattoon, Rantoul, Mahomet, Monticello, Peoria areas and any where in between.

If you know of homes or a park for sale please feel free to reach out to me. Whether its a distressed home owner, a retiring park owner, a closing park, repos what not I'm looking!

Yup, I was confused myself. IL is a tax lien state - but the liens that don't sell are bought by a county treasurer in some cases and are then auctioned off as deeds. So its the left overs of the left overs. It was confusing because the website the tax deed auction site had better information than the county tax lien auction website so I made assumptions I was looking at tax lien info. Now I know!

If I understand Champaign County procedure correctly I think he bought the tax deed out right. Reason I say that is because the press reported the property had had unpaid taxes for 16 years. With a 3 year redemption period I believe the county would have bought and the done the generic tax deed auction put on the the treasurer. @Tom Gimer In regards to the foreclosure he's already got the property so he can basically do what ever he'd like with it in the meantime. I think being a Chicago resident and 2+ hours away he's not going to have much time to enjoy the property.

Offers2Owners.com They are roughly $.99 per lead and that include the lead acquistion and the mailer. If you're just doing the mailers its $.47 I think or so? Granted, I believe its a mass mail stamp type thing on there, not hand addressed, but its still a great price.

I've found that US Bank in general has been the most generous with credit cards and terms. I recently just transferred over debt from multiple cards to two usBank cards with a 1.99% interest rate for 18 months. I haven't yet done it but I assume if I go in to ask for a business line of credit that my credit score is too low to get a good rate, i don't make enough (just left my 9-5 job), and I don't have enough assets to qualify for anything substantial. But they keep those credit card offers rolling in every so often!

I had the same issue as @Natalie Schanne but had the plumber take care of it because it was 1.) actual current leak that was not a simple drip drip drip 2.) I was out of town and couldn't be back to take care of the emergency and 3.) Friday night going into a holiday weekend which meant no one would show for non-overtime until a Tuesday or something which wasn't acceptable as it was a water leak. Had I been able to call a handyman to do it would have been a few hundred less. Had I been there to do it would have been even less but taken me hours. All in all, it was a painful chunk of change for one evening fix but was also not a headache.

I don't rebuttal against a seller using a realtor in most cases - only if they start saying how they don't want to use a realtor, but I still do provide them the insight that a realtor will be able to list it online and may bring a good deal. 

My approach is to actually encourage that they go to my competition and/or use a realtor. I'm upfront and say often 'sorry, the price right now that you're looking for is great for a retail buyer but I need to leave room for my profit,' ' have you tried talking with a Realtor?, if FSBO 'have you listed it on craigslist, zillow, and facebook buy/sell pages?.' I'm building some rapport with the seller, being honest that I'm not going to give the best price they want, and the best part is they tell me a lot of whats going through their head of reasons as to why they are marketing (or aren't) the way they are. I think they key is to be truthful though - in these cases (at least with FSBOs) you're going to be one of the lower offers and it helps them to adjust to that idea a bit better than a BAM IN YOUR FACE low ball offer out of the blue.

I think I can see where the PM may be coming from. I agree with above about the payments taking some time to the 15th. I too would be annoyed by this issue but then would call them up and have them explain the process of when they actually collect, issue late fees, etc. If its on the PMs end of administration I wouldn't fuss but if they're pocketing late fees then thats no good. 

Is this property in CA? I've heard that in that state you must paint between every single tenant no matter how bad. $500 bucks to paint an entire home is a fantastic deal but $500 bucks to do touch isn't so much. If I'm correct about this state law it may befit you to figure out what is getting painted/touched up. At the very least I would expect more of an explanation of what paint/prep is.

I would say you need to relax a bit in this situation. You're paying a company to do some work for you and its not going to be done exactly as you would do it. Have you read 'The E-Myth'? That book describes why so many small businesses fail is because the owner is getting too hands on the things he/she has hired out in order to be hands off. Unless you've created the system and hired the people and monitor the work of all the work being done and happen to employ robots the work will never be done exactly as you need. Take a step back, ask your self if you trust the company to deal with bad tenants, and ask yourself if you're making the profits you intended and if they are holding up to their end of the bargain.

Welcome @Libby Baugher to BP! Enjoy all the learning you can find!

So you're aware there are a number of meetups you could attend. I'm not sure if the peoria one is still meeting but there is one in Bloomington and I'm running the one in Champaign. 

Best of luck!

wow, i wouldnt have guessed that but i dealt with tenants in nd. Thanks for sharing.