All Forum Posts by: Blair Poelman

Your ability to keep a deposit will be based on what your lease says, and what your state landlord laws allow you to do.  If your lease is not clear, and you can't figure it out, you really should speak with a RE attorney in order to proceed correctly. 

Nothing you've mentioned seems to be any kind of major project - other than the garage which may be a permit issue.  

I would say hire a licensed contractor to finish the renovations and sell it as a move-in ready and completed home.  

Whoever buys the house now is likely going to approach it as a project, not necessarily a "home" - which means you're probably not going to get as much as you are hoping / thinking.

You might end up having to pay 10k to get the rest of it done and to clean up whatever needs fixing, but you would be selling the house to a different type of buyer.  Finishing the job will substantially expand your pool of potential buyers.   The garage thing might be an appraisal issue - which could very well hinder the sale if a buyer is using a gov't backed loan.

Any time I buy a deal that is half-way through a renovation I assume a couple things:

1.  I can beat that price down because it's a project that the seller can't handle.
2.  The seller is probably in over their head and doesn't want to / can't deal with the problem of the project.
3.  The seller is desperate - if they weren't, they would have finished the job and taken all the profit for themselves.
4.  The seller is willing to take less money to allow their problem to go away.

The last 5% of any rehab is sometimes painful and often times takes way more than 5% of the time. If I were you, I would finish the job. 

Two buildings that include a total of six office condo units.  Each office is on its own parcel Id.

Each building is 1-story.  Total rentable space is 11,000 ft / approximately 1800 ft per unit.

Foreclosure action is completed and the property is bank owned.

Valued at $1,700,000-$1,900,000.

Available for immediate disposition, bank would prefer to sell both buildings but may consider selling the buildings separately.

Contact me for more info.

Blair Poelman, 385-208-2666

Starting your story with "tenant who is mexican" probably isn't going to earn you much sympathy - there's a concept called Fair Housing.... If you're going to be in the landlord business you might want to look into it.

In my experience, a problem tenant remains a problem as long as they are allowed to. Seems that you had a bad tenant, but it sounds like there was a pretty decent lack of oversight.

@Carrie Giordano  Yes - Dual / limited agency is legal in several states - my comment was taking dual agency a step further.  

When a licensed agent is selling their own property, the agency laws (at least here in UT, and I believe everywhere else) prohibit that agent from representing the buyer of their property.   That buyer can be unrepresented and you can avoid paying a commission all together, but there is an inherent conflict when representing a buyer who will be negotiating directly with you to buy your property.   

Unfortunately half of this problem is beyond the repair stage. 

"problem neighbor" situations seem to go from 0 to 100 on paper- meaning the problem has been going on for weeks / months, but nobody has reported the problem so there is really no official track record of anything going on.  To the cops, or to the landlord, it seems like the problem came out of the blue when all of the sudden your good tenant decides to move out.  Had he/she reported the issue you likely would have got involved and solved the problem before it got to the point where now you're going to be dealing with a vacancy.

Really the solution is to inform your tenants to report bad-neighbor issues to you or to the police.

I have some horrible neighbors that were constantly having all-night house parties starting this spring.  Local police received nearly 3 dozen complaints and made 10 house visits within a 4 week period - this created a track record for the police to truly determine there was a problem.  Fastforward to mid-summer, the city filed charges against the homeowner and put multiple $500 nuisance liens on the property, with a provision that every complaint they receive immediately triggers another $500 lien with no recourse for the homeowner.

Voila - problem solved, but only because we created a track record of the problem.

@Carrie Giordano  

Having a real estate license will not make you successful as a real estate investor. 

Also, when selling your own property with your license you're really only paying (or saving) ~half the agent fee, unless you double side (which is illegal in many states, if not nation wide - an agent / broker cannot represent a principal in a transaction if they are also a principal in the same transaction).

If all you're doing is house hacking your own personal residences, there's probably very little good reason to have a license, unless you're house hacking million dollar homes.  The amount of time/money/hassle of maintaining your license really isn't the best use of time.

This is a terrible idea.

Pretty much any renter that will move into a place that is not rent-ready is going to suck.

One reason renters rent is because they don't have to do maintenance or deal with the issues that come with home ownership - so it really makes no sense for a renter to want to move into a place and do a bunch of work that an owner would have to do.  

@Ben Clayton  I always try to be positive and give more solutions, rather than accentuate problems - I regret to say I think you're going to struggle a bit on this.  

I own trailers in several communities throughout the state. Most MH communities here are hell-bent against letting any of their trailers move off the lot, unless the unit is condemned or is destroyed, or has been there for several years and is paid for in full and the lease hasn't been renewed.  Lots of ways they block a trailer from being removed. 

The only time I ever see any significant number of trailers for sale that can be moved is during freeway expansion projects - and most of those projects that would effect a park have already been completed.

Also, actually moving one of these things is task of monumental proportions. Depending on the age and the size it may require UDOT and hazmat permits, or may be barred from moving it in the first place.  You're also going to need an extremely skilled transporter.  Many of the units are 50's and 60's models, and anything that old is going to put up a pretty heavy fight before those wheels will roll - and then you have to hope the axles don't start on fire after 2 miles.  

You might find some luck going through listings in Duchesne and Carbon counties.  There are some MH's out there that just sit on lots not connected to communities and you might be able to work some of those deals.  However you've still got to figure out the transport thing. 

"standard" in this business really isn't always standard practice.  It's more like preferences that we can make decisions with.

Example:  You have a potential tenant that hits all the financial and background checks, but they come in and you get the gut feeling they are going to be a huge pain in the butt to deal with.  Just because they can pay the rent, and they will pay the rent, doesn't mean you want them as your renter.  A needy or difficult tenant can be just as bad as a tenant that you have to evict.

I also recommend using serious caution when considering bending the rules for folks that can't hit the financial qualifiers.  I've done this once, just to be the "nice guy" and give somebody a break.  My experience as a landlord is 100% negative when it comes to giving breaks (only did it once) - I'll never do that again.