All Forum Posts by: Ben Higginbotham

@Andrew Wong

You have answered your own question, first you ask how to monetize if you add AC then later you state that there is a rent discrepancy between units that have AC vs those that don't that is the way to monetize. sometimes it pays to just look at the competition and do what they are doing and not reinvent the wheel.

@Owen B.

Mike is right about photos you take, if you have produced the photos you hold the copyright regardless of who currently owns the property. Also something to note, You do not need a photo release to photograph anything that is publicly visible say the front of a house you have sold as long as you are not trespassing you can take as many photos as you want.

As for stock material depending on what you are looking for most that is available from a reputable online supplier is fine for what you are looking for, if you are looking at things that have a creative commons license that means you are allowed to use it as long as you make some change, say adding it to a flyer that contains other material. basically you can't take a stock item and use it to make money as is.

Of course this is all just my understanding use at your own risk :-D

@Jill Herges Totally understandable closing can be such a long process. Best of luck to you.

@Brian Garlington I think you might be missreading your gut. So far you say that before looking at property's you felt that slowski was not working the way you like and tried to change agents to someone that is working under the office manager (If I worked for a somewhat incompetent office manager that did not want clients taken from him I would probably just tell you to cc me on emails so I could keep an eye on him with out offending him.) Next you tried to write an offer and slowski was so slow that you felt the need to ask about it on the internet which means that you really knew the answer already. Now you are contemplating timing yourself to this guy for 30 to 60 days until closing, just think about how much aggravation you will have during that time. I have dealt with realtors that where not on my wave length and it is not fun.

Seems to me that if your sales contract says that you are to receive the security deposit then you are entitled to an amount equal to what the leases state, if they say that an amount was collected and he did not collect then shame on him, if the leases say that $0 security deposit was collected then shame on you for not catching it move on with life.

@Tom Lipps think of this from your point of view after you close. If your tenant called you and said "Your garage door was broken and I backed into it damaging my car and I want you to pay for it, but some guy I know who is not a garage door repair man/contractor came over and worked on it so there is no evidence regarding the damages to the car. That is just a bad situation tenants are not authorized to arrange for unauthorized repairs. Also I am not totally sure on a short sale but normally if the garage door falls and shatters the windows before you close then you either have the seller restored the property to the condition it was at the time you made an offer or you negotiate the price to reflect you receiving damaged property.

Why are you closing so far out? Not that it is unreasonable but maybe ask yourself if you can close earlier, all things considered maybe you can be the one making that rent money.

Hi,

To start with I am not a tax pro but here is my understanding of depreciation. First off lets take the truck example from above, that example assumes that you are depreciating to zero which you can do to increase the write off however you have the option to assign a salvage value to that truck. The salvage value is the amount that you think the equipment will be valued at the time you sell it. I.E.

Buy a truck for $30,000 if you depriciate it to a salvage value of $0 over seven years you are taking a deduction of $4,285/year, if you keep that truck for 5 years and then sell it in the current market with strong used car values you might sell it for $20,000 however you have claimed a depriciation expense of $21,425 for a true salvage value of $8,575. The Gov. sees the differance between your claimed value of $8,575 and the value that you actually sold the truck for of $20,000 and will not allow you to deduct the $11,425 differance from your taxes and they "Recapture" that in the form of taxable income. If you want to avoid that tax recapture at the time of sale then when figuring you taxes you simply adjust the salvage value to something reasnable, you might figure that if you keep a truck for 7 years it will be worth half of what you paid for it and assign a salvage value of $15,000 to that truck then your math looks like this.  

30,000 - 15,000 = 15,000 Depriciation expence,

15,000 / 7 years = 2,142/ year

Now if you sell the truck in 5 years here is what it looks like. Sale value $20,000 total depriciated $10,710 ($2,142x5) leaving a salvage value of $19,290. This gives you a recapture of $710 which is not much to be worried about. 

It all depends on your tax stragity and how long you are going to hold an item. This is why you need a good CPA that can advise you on not only how to save money on taxes  this year but also how to avoid being blindsided in later years.

On the other hand why did the breaker trip? has this happened before? If you are having problems with the AC do you want the tenant simply resetting a breaker repeatedly? Breakers generally do not just trip themselves for no reason, it can happen but should be monitered for a while to make sure there is no larger problem.

Congrats, sounds like your plan is working out well.