All Forum Posts by: Bill B.

Your local section 8 agency couldn’t tell you? I assume they’d have the final call and it might vary by market. 

Try shopping the umbrella separately. USLI and Madison were both quite a bit less than that for $3M on 12 properties and 2 cars.  

So they should both get half of everything sold and one is screwing the other out of 1/2 his inheritance? You could approach the married son with an offer on the house and to help get the property through probate. I assume live in son has probably raided the bank accounts and will forget to pay insurance/taxes etc. 

I’m never a fan of paying taxes today that you could avoid in the future. But. Remember if you do a 1031 out of Florida in to a state with income taxes you’ve just made those Florida gains taxable if you ever sell without an exchange. I’m usually doing the opposite. Do a 1031 of a property in a state with income tax back to Nevada to avoid the state income taxes. 

Could you buy a beautiful 2-4 unit, maybe on the beach, where the $1m would only go towards the rental portion of the building where you could live in another unit as your primary? Good luck. 

Unless you need the cashflow for some killer deal I always take the lower rate. Forget the interest saved by faster payback. You’re saving $5,000/yr on a $500k property. That’s an extra $400/mo of “net income”.  This is especially true the first 5-10 years of a mortgage when you’re paying almost zero principle. 

Imagine if you went with the 30 year to save cashflow every month. But then you had to write a separate check form your checking account for $400/months in straight extra interest. And that number went up every month. 

Ps. You can EASILY retire with 5 paid off properties in most markets. 10 provide a nice upper middle class living by themselves. It’s not the worst thing in the world to have a few paid off with “short” mortgages. You can always borrow the money if you need it later. Don’t pay for it today. 

You probably don’t have one, but maybe you have an equivalent. I use RC Willey. Most appliance processors are nearly equivalent. So you’re looking for more inventory, faster service, cheap/free delivery, large clearance section. 

I have a dozen rentals and they charge an annual $95 fee for unlimited delivery and removal of old appliance as well as an extra year of warranty and a 1% store rebate. It’s the $50-$100 deliver/installation and additional $50-$100 removal fee savings that add up. And while I’m no fan of extended warranties, they charge 10% of sales price for 5 additional years. 6 years on a fridge with an icemaker is a good deal at $100-$120. 

Try to avoid used and “scratch/dent” clearance. You want to show you care about your property. On VERY low end units you might avoid icemakers as they WILL fail. But I think they help me rent units faster. Also replace units as they fail with stainless. It sucks while they’re different colors, but buy more white/black appliances if like buy new carpet for the bathroom. 

Don’t forget, if you’re 4% cheaper than the competition and it rents 15 days faster, you’re way ahead. (More rent collected and less utilities you have to pay. All while reducing the danger of damage/squatters in an unoccupied property.)

If you’re 4% higher and it takes an extra 15 days, you actually lost money. 

90-99% sure your clue report will show the claims regardless of who you choose. Were the claims “large” (over $10k?) is your deductible at least $2,500 if not $5,000+?  You should never make a claim under $5k, and I wouldn’t make one under $10k for just this reason. But I have found that a larger deductible will usually pay for itself after 1 year and a 1 day. (When you make your second premium payment.)

The probate process could easily take 6-12 months. Is there a way he could search for active probate cases and then be notified if one starts? I assume that would provide the contact info. Though I suppose that puts you in competition with people that do a lot of probate buys. And they’d probably be better at judging values and getting through the system. So maybe it’s too late by then?

The PM darn well should know the law and if covering it is legal. I think it is but they should know. So I’d follow that advice. I assume you have a text/email from them saying they recommend it. 

Carpet is super cheap if the basement NEVER experiences water intrusion from outside walls or seepage from the foundation. If it does I’d switch to LVP, that should do as good/better job of sealing it in and survive water problems.