How has the coronavirus affected real estate investors?

[Tony Marcelle]

How bad has it affected your real estate business?

[Michael Wentzel]

@Tony Marcelle

Good question. As we head into August, I'm wondering what other landlords are experiencing with their tenants. 

We have 25 units in Pueblo, Colorado and 10 units in NE Ohio. We would consider most of them C-class properties. They are older houses and we have fixed them up. We have only 3 or 4 of the units on section 8. With all of that said, we have one tenant behind on rent in Colorado and one behind on rent in Ohio.

We do feel fortunate to have great tenants and property managers. But I still wonder what is happening. Did the majority of our tenants just manage to keep their jobs. Or did tenants use their stimulus checks and unemployment to pay rent and the worst is still in the future?

On the good side, we have found title companies much more willing to do online closings. We live overseas, so this is pretty key for us acquiring new properties and refinancing loans. Six months ago, many title companies we dealt with in Colorado and Ohio didn't want anything to do with online notaries or online closings. Now it seems much more common.

Mike