New landlord in London, Ontario

[Matt Geerts]

Hello!

I am an aspiring real estate tycoon currently posing as a computer engineer. I live in St. Thomas and work in London, Ontario and I'm in the middle of closing my first rental! 

I am currently trying to find people in Ontario who understand the "special" legal environment that we suffer here so I can draft an effective application and an airtight lease. I learned an incredible amount by reading about 700 threads on the Ontario Landlord Association landlord help forum, and a great deal about investing in general from BP's blog and podcasts.

As an engineer it is natural to me to put together spreadsheets, analyze risk, pore over information and weigh the pros and cons of all possible scenarios ahead of me. This helped me greatly in my search for the first one, and it will be even more important in my search for my hundredth one.

I've been a home-owner (/renovator) for 8 years and I know how to swing a hammer. I'm looking to put those skills to use in undervalued homes in my area for BRRRR strategy of growth. I'm aligned with a great lender and realtor, but perhaps a local wholesaler could complete my team to get me onto that strategy.

Once I have a great deal of equity under me, my end-game goal is to own dozens of high-end 8-and-greater-plexes in various cities, put the right people in charge of them, and go live life unencumbered.

Looking forward to learning more!

[Matt Geerts]

Thanks @Claude Boiron

My intention is to build up a lease of all of the "extras" that I find from experienced landlords that a lawyer would not include, then go to a lawyer to pour the foundation underneath it. For example, a lawyer would never put "Tenant assumes responsibility for plumbing costs deemed to be tenant's fault", but that would allow me to send over a guy with a camera to find their kid's pencil crayons and leave the bill for the tenant - thus stopping future calls of this sort, as they'd probably rather pay for a guy that doesn't bring an expensive camera. My personal banker (an ex-landlord) didn't include this clause and was paying to have the kid's things removed from the toilet every couple of weeks.

This is just a rough example of the "type" of clauses that I want to protect myself. But yes, your advice of having a lawyer ratify is very important!