All Forum Posts by: Yiv L.

Also pay attention your local Landlord-Tenant law. Some states have limit of how much landlords can demand the security deposit. For example, in Arizona security deposit can not exceed 1.5 monthly rent.

For me, I advertise mainly on CL and newspaper with calls going to my cell directly. I try to pick up as many calls as I can, but on busy days, I only call back to those who show they are more serious by leaving a voice message.

- During call back, I tell more about the property. Tell what are the requirements such as income, background checks and fees. The steps are to weed out the tirekickers as many as I can.

- Once looks more promising, I set up a date and time to show the property and ask them to bring their ID, proof of income and fund for background check. I reminder them to call or text one hour before the set time. 

- Just like @Shera Gregory, after setting up the time to show, I immediately add the caller to the contact on my phone with "Property: Name" for upcoming communications. The only different is I do NOT delete these contacts so that for my next property listing in the area, if the person call again, I sort of have some existing data to work with.

- If the person does not call or text back one hour before the showing, I sometimes text to get confirmation at around 30 min before the showing. If they do not reply immediately, I won't go to the property.

 If the were full of excuse, this is probably just another one.

You got a fine? From the city? For what? Can you see if what you did or did not do could piss off tenants, and become non-paying?

On top of what she is doing to save you a trip or two driving to the property, having someone keeping an eye on the property 24/7 (sort of) and alert you on what's going on adds a lot of values. However, I would not allow the super tenant to collect applications due to sensitive information of the applicants, and I would like to meet and talk to the applicants anyway to know who I am dealing with.

Our lease clearly states guest stay policy. If the existing tenant approaches us to add additional person to the lease, we will decide whether to allow that person to fill in the app form or not judging on quality of the existing tenant. If background check on that person fails our criteria, we will deny the addition to the lease anyway. If we allow additional person to the existing lease, we generally do not increase rent.

If the tenant allows ppl to stay before consulting us (ie, violating our guest policy), we will issue a warning. The second time around will issue the 10 days to vacate notice.

@Account Closed unless you have a lot of rentals, making your own customized lease document is probably not cost effective. Lease agreement doc is not the only doc you need. You also need addendums (pet, guest, house rules, ...). Then eventually you need non-compliant notice, pay-or-quit notice, etc etc. Every doc and every time that needs lawyer review will cost you $$. I am subscribing to on-line doc website that has all kind of templates that are customized for my state. Looks professional and easy to use. I can put together a lease and print it out in 10 min.

In terms of length of the lease, I have max 6-month for my multi and one year for SFR. For multi-family, if the applicant is good enough, but not EXACTLY what I am looking for, then the lease term is month-to-month.

25% down, and 6% on 5 year ARM? Not sure if it's your credit score or something else, but the rate is high!!

Woodpeckers made a few fist-sized holes on wood siding of one of my properties.

The problem is it's not just your tenants that can sue you. if you are at fault in a serious car accident (God forbid), you can be sued as well. To be safe, you might want to consider having umbrella policy on top of your property/car insurances if you have a lot of asset, regardless whose name they are on.