All Forum Posts by: Mike S

50% rule accounts for taxes and insurance in the expense side. Other side is debt service and cash flow. So if your first 1100 pays all the expenses, only your P&I come out of the profit side.

Those numbers look great to me.

Are these banks closing in your name or the name of your company if you have one? We have found plenty of grest NOO terms if we hold the loan personally but not in our company's name even with a personal guarantee.

Most people don't stray from the 9 to 5, 401k rat race. There is an easy formula to follow. College with debt, job to barely pay bills/two weeks off/for 40+years, crappy retirement.

I've been in your shoes my whole life. Didn't go to college, people thought I was crazy. Became a firefighter with no student debt, great salary/benefits, work a day then off two, retire at 41 with pension and insurance for life, 6 weeks vacation. But I was stupid for not going to college

Fast forward to real estate, same stuff. Sayers of neigh seemed to surround me. Been in this two short years and the results are piling up. Cashed my first 24k check yesterday from selling a rental that I had already made over 11k on in 20 months.

If you are doing something different there will be intense pressure to dissuade you. Maybe it's their fear, ignorance, or jealousy. Doesn't matter, plow ahead.

We also have another house that we picked up for 24,500 in December 2014 that has been rented since January for 625/month.

Our plan is to reinvest the proceeds from the sale into a 4plex. Things are starting to pick up speed.

I'm sure 16k isn't much to some, but for our first deal it's amazing.

Bought a decent home for 18,500 out of foreclosure that someone had lost their butt on renovating. 100 year old house with new everything in 2010. We put new carpet in and replaced vandalised electric and plumbing.

We intended it to be a long term rental but the market took off and we sold for 42,000. We paid 1900 in closing costs and bought them a home warranty for 435.

We had about 8k down to purchase, 3k in renovation. After 20 months we had collected about 11k in rent. Walked from the closing with a 24k check.

It was our first and therefore hardest but well worth it! Also have to thank everyone at BP for the help and knowledge. 

I use and highly recommend erentpayment. Very easy to use and they are now doing online applications as well. If you have a smartphone (and what tenant doesn't) you can pay your rent.

Did you do a move out walk through and provide them with a list of charges? I also explain that we get 30 days to return the deposit to allow for unpaid utilities, etc to come in. If they harrass you, call the police.

Heat pump or mini splits. With 1000sqft the ductless mini split might be the best option.

This won't help the current situation, but in the future go all electronic. When I refund through erentpayment it's deposited directly into their account with records from them that the transaction occured. No lost in the mail, "I didn't get it", or other BS. Well worth the small fee.

I use Postlets and Craigslist but find that I get much better responses from Postlets. IMO Craigslist could be renamed Scamlist or Dirtbaglist. I don't think I've ever rented to someone from Craigslist in my short landlording experience.

Rentometer works great for my area as most of the comps is pulls are either historical or current listings.