All Forum Posts by: Bruce C.

Why are you refi'ing your current SFH? If it is to save money (get rid of PMI or lower rate), then yeah you should do it now. You will get better terms as owner occupied. Also no guarantee rates won't go up.

If you are planning on refi'ing the duplex, I'd go with the lower out of pocket now. Keep the cash in your pocket in case you need it for repairs. If you take the cash out when you reFi, you'll likely pay a higher rate for that loan than you would for a straight ReFi, so you probably won't save much if anything over paying PMI for a little while.

Small update to what feels like my failing quest.

Made more offers and have bid on some properties at the courthouse, but no new property yet. I can't figure out if what people are asking and/or estimating for ARV will hold or not. For instance, house in Galveston on the market for about 3 weeks. Only 800 sqft, small 2700 sqft lot, no garage, no driveway, not elevated with a storage area underneath, and essentially off Broadway, 1 mile from beach.

It is pretty much a gut and redo, and the guy wants $125k for it, and I'm not sure he's far off from what he'll get. He turned down our 90k offer. Just 2 years ago I paid 85k for a 1000 sqft home with a small driveway, underneath storage, 4100 sqft lot, already had central hvac, and just need about $10-15k to be nice, and it is just 6 blocks away, same distance from beach. My realtor thinks $225 is a reasonable ARV if it is done nice, but I just don't feel comfortable that is possible. I'm pretty much afraid to jump in to anything right now because I don't know if I need to recalibrate my expectations in price or if the bottom is going to drop out.

Have made a tiny bit of progress on the cash flow side. I installed those flood vents at the smaller Airbnb and saved 2300 a year on flood insurance. Also finally got the flat roof at the duplex replaced ($3600, including inspection) so it can pass engineering inspection, and it has and the WPI8 has been submitted, and as soon as it is on file I’m going to save 4000 a year there. 

After / Before (lol at the shingles for flashing)

These vents were $100 each and can be installed if you passed cutting and gluing in kindergarten. Needed 4 for my 1000 sqft unit. Looking at the picture now, I really need to wash my siding... 😆

Nice!  I wish I’d done the same before I got married, or even before we had kids.  Are these long term roommates or college students/str?  What is your second property?  Have you looked at duplexes-quadplexes?

Hi there - the layout looks the same in the kitchen. Did you just paint the cabinets?  If so, how did you get them to look that nice after painting?  Or are those new doors and drawers (custom made of so?  Was that a better price than new cabinets)?  

 Hi Ethan. I've been looking for an RE lawyer the last few days as well. Unfortunately, the person I've used before via my realtor/PM had a stroke.

Here is the short story. Let me know if you can help me with this or recommend someone who can.

-Property foreclosed on in ~2000, ISD took possession.
- law firm repping ISD has it listed for sale, said send them a check when I asked about it

- I sent check and pulled title (probably should have reversed order), and in 2015 the neighboring properties were granted "fee simple rights" by the city council

- county still showed isd as owner, so it is exempt status and no one had  paid taxes on it in ~20 years
- ISD law firm said they didn't know about it and are looking in to it. They can't give me advice (they rep isd) but said they can still sell their interest.

So I'm trying to figure out if we can build on it and/or resale it. 

I think you needed to be looking at Austin 20 years ago to find that. Is the Rundberg area still rough?  I lived in what I would consider a rough area in 2002ish off el Camino, but I think people that live truly rough areas would laugh at that being a bad area even then.  But most of the places I know that were sketchy have been bought and rebuilt from what I see every time I go visit. 

 Agree with Ted. At least in my area, townhome kitchens don’t have that much countertop area, so even if you went with an expensive granite it still wouldn’t be that much. But you don’t need to go expensive for granite to look nice for most rentals. HD usually has a sale once or twice a year where you can get their lower priced granite purchased, delivered, and installed fora bout $35/sqft. Also, if you have time, you can check out the surplus materials stores.  I’ve seen nice left over granite for dirt cheap. If you have a small enough kitchen, you might find enough of one to use. I always think I’m going to pick some up and make a nice table or something but never do. 

My property manager started working on it this weekend. One of our tenants in our duplex owes us about 2-3k, about half of that being water and yard maintenance. 

TurboTax will walk you through owning a rental property. If you’ve been using TT and can use google, I’d be willing to bet you can figure out enough to keep using TT at least for this year, and probably next. We only have 3 rentals at this point and are still using TT. 

Edit - oh, and you do have expenses most likely. Google and some of TT steps will help.  Did you pay for an inspection?  Drive to visit properties? You probably have some you don’t even realize. Google what is allowable deductions and sit down and think about what you did to get to the point of purchase. Also start a spreadsheet so you can track as you go for next year. There are quite a few free templates

Agree with Paul, but it is a it market dependent. Covid has (temporarily?) changed some of the timing, but a lot places have their booking traffic peak more than a week out. In most instances, the last minute booking is people looking for deal and you’ll need to cut rates (week or less, maybe 2 weeks depending on market). You’re just getting started, so not having optimal booking prices right off the bat isn’t going to kill you, and is kind of expected anyway. 

I’ll add - are you absolutely sure you’re going to be ready when you think you are?  You don’t want to be cancelling your first bookings because you’re waiting on someone to finish the kitchen or deliver the furniture. The first AirBnB we started was in a property we were doing a light (but still our first) rehab on. I was at the the house til 3 AM finishing installing the dishwasher 2 nights before our first booking because we were sure we we’re going to have it ready by X date!

Learned our lesson for the next one. Was finishing up late at night 7-10 days out from our first booking. Much more cushion :)