All Forum Posts by: Andrew Magoun

Do you own in Portland, Maine? Do you live in Portland? Then you need to know about Question 1 on the ballot this November 7th. Question 1 is a citizens' initiative that will (among other things):

-impose rent control (rents will be capped at their Nov. 1st, 2017 level and can only go up by in increase in property taxes and the Consumer Price Index), 

-create a tenant dominated rent board (out of 7 members there will be at least 4 tenants and 1 landlord),

-almost double the unit registration fees (from $35/unit to $65/unit),

-significantly increase the time it takes evict tenants (upwards of an additional 90 days), 

-allow a group of volunteer citizens to impose fines on property owners,

-effectively remove the term of a lease (the lease being over will no longer be reason to evict a tenant). 

Per City rules, if this passes it cannot be changed for 5 years.

There is a lot more information about this referendum, how poorly it is written, and how dangerous it will be to both investors and renters (especially those who it is supposed to help!) here: http://www.saynotorentcontrol.com/ Please educate yourself, your tenants, and any voters in Portland about this issue. Question 1 will have a negative impact on investors, tenants, and property owners.

@Darwin Crawford, good luck with the project. I've toyed around with the idea of finding a good solar producing building here and putting as much PV on it as I can and then using the excess to bring down electricity costs on other buildings that I own. I need to find a good way to run the numbers on that though to see if it's really actually worth it. I have PV on my own house and love it, but making the business call on it is a bit harder.

We just had a local REI meeting and the idea of pet deposits came up. A comment from a lawyer was something to the effect of, "don't have a pet deposit, instead increase the security deposit." The view is that the tenant can destroy the property as much as they want and as long as the pet didn't do it they have to get the pet deposit back. If you just increase the security deposit then you can use that money for whatever damage there is , whether it's caused by the pet or not.

Jon Holdman , all told the properties are worth about 1.3 mil.

Thanks @Steven Accardo!

I currently have 9 units spread over three properties and am under contract for adding a duplex. All told, there is about $400k in equity built up between the three properties. I'd like to be able to tap into that. 

Here's the tricky part: All three properties have private loans with interest rates under 3% and very good terms. What's the best way to tap that equity without drastically increasing my borrowing costs? Is that even possible? Is it worth it to even try? Thanks in advance for the advice.

@Jessica Harriet, the Portland, ME real estate market is very hot right now and a rent stabilization effort is on the ballot in November. That said, it's a great place to live and Portland has a lot to offer, especially if you like good food, good beer, and the outdoors.

We charge $25 per pet with two cats maximum and one dog maximum. There are certain breeds our insurance won't allow, so you definitely want to have information on the type of dog first so you know you're covered in case there's an issue (dog bites someone). I view the pet fee as an extra source of income and am betting that whatever damage a pet might cause will be less than the total amount we're getting over the course of the rental.

We've been pleased with BellPort Property Management.

Wow. Just wow.

I'm very curious to see the end results and what else, if anything, was behind the judge's decision.