All Forum Posts by: William Levin

Thanks for the responses!

If I hire someone else without giving the original contractor a chance to fix his mess wouldn't that absolve him of responsibility? I thought I had to give him a chance to make things right first.

We had a contractor build a new master bathroom but were disappointed with the quality of the work and did not let him bid on any more work on the house. Today I discovered mold on the wall of the adjoining room, directly behind where the new shower is. I texted him a picture of the mold asking him how he planned to address it and he responded by saying that he would come look at it but if the mold had nothing to do with the shower he installed, he would charge me a $350 trip fee. We didn't part on good terms and he knows he is not getting any more work from me so I feel that he will do anything he can to avoid responsibility.

I'm confident the mold is from the shower. How should I proceed? Should I agree to his terms and have the Go-Pro running when he cuts into the wall, or should I have an independent inspector come out and inspect not just this leak, but all the other work he did? I'm sure the inspector will find other issues such as puddling on the shower pan, unlevel floors, excessive tile lippage, etc that we could use against the contractor if we had to. I really just want to move on and I'd fix it myself if I thought it was just a simple leak, but I don't want to cut into the wall and discover there is a bigger mess and the contractor have an out by not being present when I opened the wall.

We were all set to close on a rental that I'm selling but the buyer refuses to close because our title company did not provide him with a municipal lien search, which is part of the contract. Closing was set in the contract for today but will now be delayed because the search will take 7-10 days. My carrying costs for this property are around $50/day. I have a good relationship with this title company and don't want to damage it but my wife is not happy with the delay and having to absorb the additional carrying costs. Buyer is a cash buyer so no delay on his part. Should I ask the title company to absorb the additional carrying cost? Is this something they would consider since the delay is due to their oversight?

Thanks?

Hi Brandon,
I'm curious why you decided to move to Lake Wales from Atlanta. I live in Bartow and would think that this market offers fewer opportunities than Atlanta.
I've been considering a similar strategy as yours lately as it's getting harder to find retail flips. The market for low priced rentals in decent condition is a little tough right now though. As you probably already figured out, low priced properties in decent areas and condition are getting harder to find. Hopefully things will pick up again now that the election is over. If you'd like to get together sometime and toss around ideas, just let me know. I'd be happy to share what I know.
Bill Levin

I tried to post a property using Postlets recently and Craigslist "ghosted" it. I waited two days and reposted the property the old fashioned way - no Postlets or HTML- and Craigslist allowed it. I'm pretty sure CL frowns on HTML is is just not letting those postings through.

Hi all,

I've been reading lately about some flippers that have been doing very well, but most of them seem to be concentrated in the DMV, Atlanta, or other large MSAs. I live in FL and the largest town within 45 minutes of me has a population of about 100k. I don't know of any investors that are actually "killing it" doing flips here, although some are building a great rental portfolio with properties that cashflow from day one.

Is it almost a requisite that one live in a large metro area in order to make $200K+ per year flipping houses? Is it possible to do it in a much smaller area like mine? I would love to hear from anyone who has actually done it.

Bill (FL)