My first duplex renovation and rental!

[Justin Klinghagen]

Thought I’d share some details of my summer project. My first of hopefully many real estate deals! I’ve been reading books, reading forums, going to meetups and listening to podcasts for probably the last 2 years and finally convinced myself to take action and give myself a bit of a challenge. I knew I was as prepared as I could be to jump in and just needed to do a deal to really learn, hopefully not losing all my money in the process. I definitely learned a ton and while this is by no means a home run deal it should do ok for me and my family.

The property is a side-by-side duplex in E St Paul right on the border with Maplewood. Built in 1960, each unit started with 2 beds, 1 bath on each side on the main level. 1 unit had a nearly finished full bathroom and framed in bedroom and living room in the basement. The other unit had just a toilet and sink in the basement but otherwise was a blank canvas.

Renovations upstairs included ripping out carpet and refinishing hardwoods, painting all walls and trim, new front and rear entry doors, new flooring in kitchens and bathrooms, adding exhaust fans to bathrooms, refinished the tubs, new vanities and toilets, painted kitchen cabinets and new laminate counters. I also replaced the fridge and range in one of the units and added dishwashers to both. In the basements I added a bedroom and bathroom to each so each unit is now a 3 bed 2 bath, each with a good sized living room downstairs as well. I also ended up having to replace both boilers.

I ended up hiring a general contractor to do the renovation. The renovation was scheduled to take about 6 weeks but ended up taking almost 20 weeks. Pretty ridiculous, I know. I was pretty careful upfront with screening my contractor (checking license, insurance, signing contract, researching online) but I basically just took the recommendation from an acquaintance and didn’t ask for any other referrals or work samples (my fault, not the acquaintance’s). I was impressed with his promptness, detailed bid and excellent communication upfront but all those things went out the window after a couple weeks. Honestly the work turned out ok for the most part but I’m definitely in the market for a new contractor….

Couple of things I’d do differently:

-Fire the contractor sooner and work harder to find a good one upfront

-Focus on properties with beds and baths upstairs. The basements turned out great but I didn’t get the value I was looking for which is going to make my next deal take longer to get to.

-For how much it cost me to paint the kitchen cabinets I think I’d just replace them next time. This would have allowed me to rearrange some stuff at the same time too so the kitchen flowed better.

Both units are now rented as of late August after quite a lengthy search, which I was surprised by given the hot summer season. This has been much more eventful than I thought it would be as well, especially given that I hired a property management company but I’m not scared away yet!

Any questions, let me know!

[Justin Klinghagen]

@Josh Cook

Yes I did get everything permitted, didn't want any safety issues for my tenants, potential issues with the city, issues with insurance if something happened or issues selling the property down the road.  Definitely don't regret doing it the right way upfront. 

We had some minor issues with the permitting process, some of it possibly due to the inspector and some due to the contractor.  Prior owner had the electrical panels replaced at some point but apparently didn't have it permitted. Since we were adding circuits and changing out outlets the inspector ended up having us change out a lot of breakers to Arc fault and putting grounding rods in. The cost for the permits themselves seemed to add up quite a bit more than i was expecting but we did it right for sure.