All Forum Posts by: Ashley Shearer

@Joe Norman @Lorraine Pennington found this post in searching for our own lock system. I see you both went opposite routes - any reviews? How are they going? 

We have newer properties with Kwikset locks and also have a few older properties that have the very thin doors with the old-style bolt locks (https://www.homedepot.com/p/Pr...) I'm curious if there might be something that would work for both? Or perhaps we just need to buy/install new doors. 
Thanks!

@Curtis Bowen - I know this was an old post but I have some questions and hoping you're still on the site. We have a tenant that committed suicide in one of our rentals. There is blood on the carpet but not a large space, about 3-4 square feet. There are also some blood marks on the wall where I guess her husband touched the door/door frame. The damaged area seems small. Are we legally allowed to clean it up ourselves and replace the carpet/flooring? Does it need to be certified or anything like that? We are in Pennsylvania. Thank you!

@Account Closed It worked! Thank you very much. Just searched the book again and realized I missed the time tracking step. Thank you again!

@Account Closed - I am just setting up quickbooks and did exactly what you said above about the Water (I pay sewer, trash and invoice my tenants). I opened the vendor and wrote a check, listed the trash and sewer separately at the bottom, put the tenant name in the customer field and put the unit in the class field. When I went to the customer center, nothing shows up under a bill they owe or an invoice for the amount. How do I find the customer invoices to print out and mail to them? 

Hello all - thanks in advance for any help! Advice needed for newbies! Tenant broke lease and moved out early, explaining the living conditions were 'uninhabitable' due to noise/fighting from tenant on other side. 

Quick & Dirty:

- April 18: Settled on duplex, inherited one tenant on each side, Tenant A (male) Tenant B (female)
- May 18: Tenant A asks to move girlfriend in, we say no, he moves girlfriend in without our knowledge anyways. 
- Oct 13, 2018: Tenant B complains of loud fighting, first complaint. We inform Tenant A to call police if it gets too bad. We warn Tenant B about noise. Find out he moved her in. Tell him to move her out or we'll end his lease. 
- Over next 2.5 weeks, we speak with police and proceed to find legal help to begin eviction proceedings properly (first time, no experience). We also receive one more complaint from Tenant B again. We inform her to call police if it gets bad (she has not called police yet).
- Oct 31: Tenant A girlfriend is harassing Tenant B with banging on her door, loud noises. Tenant B finally calls police. This is her 3rd complaint to us. 
- Nov 1: Give notice to quit to Tenant A. 
- Nov 12: Tenant B emails us that she has moved out as of Nov 3 and left the keys. We text her last week asking where rent check was, she lied and said she would send it again. No rent. 

Lease states she has to give 60 days notice to end lease. She only complained to us a few times and we feel we worked as fast as possible (and as fast as lawyers would allow) to evict. We, legally, had to give tenant 'notice to quit' and could not evict immediately, so this would have taken time regardless. 

Is this worth pursuing the unpaid rent, for at least one month? She has lived there for at least 5 years, I know there will be expenses to flip and to get a new tenant in, and her security deposit is less than a regular month's rent. I can try to do it as quickly as possible but I'd like her to pay at least this month's rent. 

Any advice appreciated!

Hey @Justin R.- how did the units as sub-classes go? Can you see reporting on them? 

@Anthony M. just started looking for a CC for myself, for the exact same reasons as you. Did you settle on a card? Any feedback?

Hello - question on this. Do you have to state somewhere (in the listing or on the application) that you don't accept smokers? I did not put that anywhere in my listings or application specifically, but my app does have a question "Does anyone who will occupy the property smoke?" and the applicant answered "yes". Can I deny them without having told them in the first place? 

I would assume not - since you can deny for all types of reasons without writing them all out, but wanted to be sure. 

Was just going to tag in from an accounting standpoint - Reserves are recorded on the balance sheet, not on the income statement (which mirrors the Schedule E). Therefore, just per accounting standards, I take reserves out after NOI like in your second example.

My confusion is around vacancy, which is taken on your example from gross rental income. Is that an actual vacancy expense, or a reserve account? I was accounting for vacancy reserves below NOI with my other reserves, and then I assumed when I had an ACTUAL vacancy, I would take it out of rental income. Not sure.

Maybe the accounting experts could tag in here? If you guys know Nicholas Aiola or Brian Schmelzlen could someone tag them or another known expert?

Hello! We also just bought a duplex with an inherited tenant in central PA. We'll be occupying one side and had a few of the same questions. UGI quoted us an average of about $75/month with winter bills reaching $120 at highest for the one side (3 small bedroom, 1 bath). When I called to set up my new account, I asked for the monthly averages from the last year and they gave them to me.

Garbage/water - Will be different for your area probably, but they send us a quarterly bill and has to go to owner's name. We will get 2 bills, one for each side of the house. The previous seller said he just made a copy and gave the tenant the exact bill which shows who/where to pay.

Have to honor existing lease (ours is up in one year). At the end of that year, you can decide to term the lease and they will have to leave, or if they're good tenants you can keep them.

We have a shared driveway. Seller told us that in the lease, it states that the tenants have the responsibility to have snow removed from sidewalk by a certain time (I think he said by 7am or something, whatever the local law states). He then told them that he will try to get it done but he works on-call sometimes, so they know that if he doesn't get it done, they have to shovel the sidewalk. I believe driveway doesn't technically matter - it's just sidewalks and public areas like that. And in that case, I think we're leaving it to tenants to essentially split the sidewalk & just shovel their half.

When we move out, we'll likely expect tenants to shovel.