All Forum Posts by: Caleb Gray

@Kathryn Daniel @George Skidis do you know if any of those laws apply specifically to single unit rentals, larger complexes, or all types? I'm trying to pick through the laws to see if managing a one-off property (single-family home) is OK or not since I'm not licensed at all.

Thanks!

I'm a maybe based on some other things my wife has going on. But hopefully I'll be able to come!

@Steven Duran you should come check it out!

Boy, I wish I had better insurance :/ I had a huge rainstorm back up the city sewer system into one of my units (also while I was on vacation) and didn't have sewer backup on the policy. Hello unexpected 15k renovation! But you can bet I'll never omit that coverage again and will be reviewing what other "optional" policies there are that my agent neglected to tell me. Way to keep it positive though, I'll bet that place will look fantastic after to renovation.

@Denice S. - that sounds like a great idea! I do plan on doing most if not all of the repair work myself at this point (everything but the drywall...and I may try that) but I will ask for sure on this and any future jobs I may need help on.

@Daniel Hyman - I'll try to check into that with my agent some more, but I don't have a lot of hope that's the issue

@Jeff Bridges - I completely agree. The main issue is that it's my father-in-law...so yet another example of never mixing family and business. I'm learning as I go along. I will for sure be asking Service Master about the billing rate though because it's a family business and they seem likely to work with me. I'll for sure be putting in/fixing those backwater valves and maybe even a sump pump depending on what it would cost.

@Brandon Carriere - yes, the silver lining here is the damage required removing all of the nasty original carpet and 9" tile underneath it allowing me to put down some sweet vinyl plank flooring throughout the place. 

@Caleb Heimsoth - what is an adjuster? I've never heard of that before.

@Cheryl Butler - yes, 1200 sq feet of finished basement. It was probably in need of a renovation at some point in the next 10 years, but that schedule just got moved up. Replacement drywall from 2' down, new floors, new trim, rehabbing/refinishing the existing cabinets or buying all new for both kitchen and bathroom, along with fixes to make sure it doesn't happen again.

Hello BP!

I was on vacation out-of-state last week when every investor's vacation nightmare happened: My tenant called and told me the unit was flooding (being destroyed). I called Service Master and they were able to start working in a timely fashion thankfully. Service Master determined the cause of the issue was the sewer system being overwhelmed during a recent storm where 2-3 inches fell in an hour. The unit does not have a sump pump and it appears only one of the drains had a backwater valve, but I don't even know if it worked correctly. 

I started checking into options to cover the damages and repairs, but right now I'm coming up empty, and the bill is going to be 10-15k even if I do a majority of the repairs myself. I'm just getting started in my investing career (this was the first property I purchased, less than a year ago), and I probably have just enough between my savings and a loan against my retirement account, but that would wipe out everything, even the emergency fund in case of a medical emergency or car emergency, so I'd love to not have to drain it all. Here's what I've looked into so far:

1. Home insurance - unfortunately, mine did not include flood or sewer backup, so my agent told me there's nothing he can do.
2. Attorney - I asked him if there was anything I could do to make the city cover it since this was a public infrastructure failure. He connected me with a guy from the public works, but that guy just told me my town has no funding for anything like this because Illinois sucks (my words, not his). I'm not sure if there's any legal action I can take, but I plan to talk to him tomorrow about it.
3. Home warranty - I'm checking into this now, but I don't think I had my seller purchase a home warranty upon closing

Has anyone else dealt with something similar and found other ways to cover the damage other than swallowing the huge bill?

Thanks,

Caleb

Hello all,

I'm part of a group that has BP meetups in my area on a monthly basis, but the date of the month is not fixed (sometimes it's the 5th, sometimes it's the 15th, etc.). Because of this I often forget to check the Events page for meetups near me when our organizer makes the event.

Is there some mechanism on the site that would allow the organizer to create a group (like Facebook) or channel (like Slack) for the event series, allowing me to join the group or subscribe to the channel and receive notifications when a new event is posted?

If not, how have others hacked their way around this difficulty?

Thanks!

Caleb

@Craig Curelop a suggestion to improve these forms would be to include a .docx format that could be used to adjust/tweak as necessary. Your suggestion on the purchase page's fine print to have these reviewed by a lawyer is good advice, but I assume most lawyers would want to tweak things and landlords may want to add things, so having a very easy format to do that in would be very helpful.

I tried importing from the PDF to .docx with mixed results because of the formatting.

Ahhh drat. I won't be able to make it, but hopefully next time!