All Forum Posts by: Zachary Ware

I would advise making sure expectations are set early... and followed through with. Make sure that everyone knows what is expected of them in regards to rent, utility split, and even down to house rules such as cleaning up after themselves and quiet hours. Having always lived with roommates in college this was one of the first things I learned. It is a lot harder to start this process later.

I agree with others here. If they do not clean the unit already, it is unlikely he does it with a "how-to guide". If nothing changes after your 30-day notice, get him out as soon as possible following local regulations an make sure the property is pest-free before the next tenant moves in.

I prefer mounting to the wall with an adjustable mount. Like others have said, it is less likely to get damaged and the fix to the wall in the event you take it down is typically minimal.

I think the bigger the better. Many traveling nurses will rent out a place in groups and you see many people adding as many rooms to a property that they then rent out by the room. Be careful not to create functional obsolesce when adding rooms or you can have trouble with financing on a refi or your buyer if you end up selling.

 I agree with @Joe Villeneuve. If it does not Cash Flow, do not buy. Look at different markets, wait until your market changes, change investment strategies. But don't buy a liability, especially in this situation. The deal does not work with a 2.5% rate and you won't be getting lower than that anytime soon.

Thanks Nick for the post! When I first got interested in RE I thought there were too many acronyms to manage not to mention the metrics. I found that Break Into CRE on youtube is a great resource for getting an initial understanding.

Hey Taylor,

Congratulations on the first fix and flip! 

Hey Evan,

You aren't going to find all of this information in one place. For taxes you can typically pull the bill from the county assessor's office online, for insurance you are going to need to reach out for quotes, for crime you can typically find this information put out by the city's police department as a crime viewer map. The models really depend on what property type you are underwriting. I would look at a few different models and try to get a deep understanding of what is going on before making your own model to use for UW deals. This is more time-intensive but I believe is a win in the long run. PM if you would like to discuss more.

As others have said, it really depends on the location, type of property, how the meters are split, what you structure in your lease, and even your strategy. For example, as a student rental property that is rented by the room, all of the utilities are billed together and I pay them, and then split the cost across all tenants. This is how it is structured in the lease.

You should look into some hard money lenders who can go up to 85 or 90% Loan to Cost and work with houses in need of rehab.