All Forum Posts by: Ben Sears

I've encountered my first payment issue with a tenant. For what it's worth, I'm not here to ask for advice but to simply share my experience in hopes that it helps someone else.

I purchased a SFH in September of last year with a tenant already in place. She lives with her two teenage children and has been an absolute rock star. Payments arrive on time, the house is spotless each time I visit, and I rarely hear from her. I've made some upgrades to the property after raising her rent slightly (despite the fact that it's still far under market value). So I get a phone call today from my tenant who wants me to stop by for a short meeting. She's very slim on details during the phone conversation, but I agree to meet her this afternoon. When I arrive, she wastes no time in telling me that she and her son have had a fight and he has decided to move out. Come to find out, it would appear that they are splitting the bills with him paying the majority of the rent. This has obviously left her high and dry this month for rent (which is due today).

Now my "regular" job is a firefighter/paramedic in a very "not so great" part of the city, so I'm intimately familiar with not bs'ing around with people in order to get them to do what you need them to do. I very politely, yet firmly restated the lease agreement. I told her that we allow a five day grace period and that the full rent would be due by next Friday (I gave her this weekend since everything will be closed for an impending snow storm). I made some helpful suggestions on how to pay her rent and told her to keep me in the loop next week. I very respectfully thanked her for being honest and upfront with her phone call and that it goes a long way in our conversation. I am hopeful that she makes rent as I would love to keep her. However, I won't have an issue replacing her and raising the rent again.

I need to credit Brandon Turner's "The Book on Managing Rental Properties". I'm 3/4 of the way through this book and it really assisted in pointing me in the right direction. It made me think of the consequences of forgiving rent payments and late fees, as well as how to respectfully deal with your tenants. I highly encourage any new landlords to invest in this book as it will truly pay for itself 100x.

I'll continue to update next week as our saga unfolds. Have a great weekend!

I'm currently looking at ~5.5 acres in which four 850 sq. ft. SFH are located. All are rented and the price per home works out to about $22k each which is a steal. All are in fair to good condition in a C+ area. I haven't investigated terribly much into rent rates and such, but my question lies in the technicalities of surveying and future plans. Am I getting myself into trouble with refinancing having multiple properties on one lot? Is it better to get the lot surveyed and break the properties up for future buy and hold or sale? I'm a fairly experienced investor but never tackled a weird situation like this before.

Alright....who's behind this one in Dallas? Seems a little over the top. Not to mention, who has time to inspect a parking lot full of cars? 

https://dfw.cbslocal.com/2019/01/02/apartments-car-dent-policy-family-risk-homelessness/

@Shawn McGarity don't stress over it. You're going to make mistakes and have garbage contractors. It happens to all of us. I got stiffed by a painter one time that ended up being a crack head. Live and learn I suppose! I will give you this piece of advice...when you find a great contractor treat them right. Give them as much business as you can and refer them around. Treat them right and you'll be on your way to building a great team!

I can give you a PM in the Chesterfield area that also does realty services. Also, you may consider East End Henrico County in the Highland Springs/Sandston area. I'm very familiar with the area and have been looking at some properties myself. It's in a fairly heavy buy and remodel phase right now and may be a good time to get in.

Full disclosure, I'm a contractor and an investor. Get three estimates from contractors and compare them. Don't be afraid to ask for previous customer reviews. Just for reference, I mark up any of my subcontractors when I bid a job. This covers my time for phone calls and supervision as well as the liability if they screw something up. This is where your "all in one guys" can get pricey.

For example, you hire me to do a complete remodel and I hire a plumber that charges me $1500. I'm going to turn around and charge you cost +20%. Rinse and repeat with every sub that does work that I'm not licensed to do. Some people attempt to crucify contractors over this, but it's a business and we have time/labor/money spent hiring and keeping good subs.

To avoid this, you can choose to be your own contractor and sub out all of the work yourself. I've used Thumbtack and found loads of good subs. I steer away from Angie's list and Home Advisor because subs can pay to be at the top of the list.

You may find more luck with contacting specialty contractors (flooring, cabinets, roof, etc) than one "all in one" guy. The benefit to having specialty contractors is two fold in my opinion. For one, specialty contractors only work on one or two sub systems. They have every tool known to man to handle that specific job. They also more than likely have established relationships with vendors that you don't have access to and will provide a much better product. I have a fantastic plumber, but I'm not going to let him anywhere near my roof because I have an excellent roofer.

The second reason I like having specialty contractors is that if I have to fire a sub, I'm not losing my entire contracting crew. I may only be searching for a new roofer, flooring guy, plumber, etc rather than putting an all stop on my project. The only time you may benefit from the "all in one handyman" is after you have some established rentals and have maintenance and repairs to do. A good jack of all trades will be worth his weight in gold as most specialty subs aren't interested in coming all the way out to replace a door knob and/or their hourly rate makes maintenance calls prohibitive.

Finally, I'll speak to licensing and insurance. Please make sure you contractor is licensed and insured. There are too many fly by night guys that don't stand behind their work and will end up causing you many headaches. Hint: they'll be the cheapest one and will bring their brother, uncle, sister, cousin with them to "help". Don't be afraid to make your contractor submit their license and insurance with their WRITTEN estimate. You may also be able to look up contractors through your state's licensing board and view past violations and fines.

I hope this helps. Please feel free to connect and PM me if I can be of any further assistance.

Personally, I've never heard of paying utility bills one time during the year. In Virginia, it's always billed monthly which would be easy to pass on to the tenant. You may try visiting the water authority (or whoever does the billing) and see if the tenant can sign up for water and sewer under their name and separate it from the tax bill. Surely there are other rental properties in the area dealing with the same issue. Other than that, it's going to be a constant battle between you and the tenants on usage.

I would be cautious to just claim all of the items as your own and dispose of as you wish. A quick Google search for Georgia Landlord Tenant Laws sheds some light (Your profile says Savannah, so I'm assuming that's what we're dealing with). Refer to page 59, but the entire thing is probably a good read. It would be well worth your time (and money) to consult a real estate attorney before disposing of any property.

https://www.georgialegalaid.org/files/6FCBD72D-B46...

What area of Richmond are you looking at? I have a PM in Chesterfield, but he mainly manages only in that area.

@Ashish Acharya thanks a bunch! Exactly the answer I was looking for. I appreciate your time.