All Forum Posts by: Allan Szlafrok

I own in Newark

@Eric Bradeis You need a good local attorney because it’s an easy process to screw up by yourself. Also a quick warning, you have to register as a landlord with the county clerk in the county in which the property is located. I’m bringing this up because landlord tenants courts just started enforcing this recently and a lot of cases are being delayed because the landlord never registered. For this and other reasons JC pays to get a lawyer to give you the best chance of success.

@Stefanie R. As an investor in JC I can tell you that area is pretty rough although it is improving. I own a property on MLK but it's near Communipaw which is a better area. Condos are rarely a good investment and you need to check the financial status of the HOA to see if they are able to maintain the common areas. Also JC is an extremely hot market and for it to be sitting there for 38 days is a red flag. I feel like this is one of those properties that are "cheap for a reason". I would look for value add opportunities in JC which are hard to come by but not impossible. The west side is seeing a lot of improvement as is Bergen Lafayette but try to stay within a couple of blocks of the light rail.

@Ronnie Hutchinson Consider virtual staging to get your listing to really pop. They photoshop in nice furniture and do a great job with the lighting to make the house look like a million bucks. They can even change the color of the sky outside although in Florida that’s not usually an issue. I get a lot of people calling after I virtually stage and getting people in the door is the first step to getting them to sign a lease. It’s really helped me out and it’s not very expensive.

You can ask a lawyer to draw up the paperwork after you've agreed to something in principal. Just make an offer and work from there. I had a similar situation in JC where the tenant didn't want to move out and wasn't paying rent so i asked the seller for a reduction in price equal to 3 months of rental payments and i would handle the situation after we closed. It worked out the tenant left next month no eviction necessary just returned her security deposit which was transferred in the sale. If you cant get the tenant out maybe offer the buyer a price reduction it worked for me.

@Tom Makinen EBay. Set your own price just be aware of the PayPal fees and shipping costs.

@Chi Ta I do local to my market but Alaska is as far away from my market as you can be without leaving Earth. I know companies like Corevest are in that space so I’d recommend contacting them and seeing who else competes with them to find the best rate.

@Chi Ta yeah you’d need a commercial loan and they’d usually do 70%. Long term Jard money isn’t the way to go but there are programs out there for long term non conventional financing but the interest rates are high and makes cash flowing hard especially if you are above the 70% threshold. Ask around and see if they make sense but I usually just go with a standard commerical loan.

@Chi Ta You need to add significant equity to the properties during the rehab phase. In my case I also kept many properties without a mortgage for a while as prices were rising and refinanced later. That may not work anymore but you still need realize significant equity gains to pull off a true BRRR with conventional financing.

@Jo Ballagh in any state that gets cold winter is the hardest time to find new tenants or to evict non paying ones. I’d rather not extend the lease but if you do don’t make it month to month with a verbal agreement to leave eoy get it in writing for sure.