All Forum Posts by: Callie Edward Muckelroy

After reprogramming the lock, all works as it should!

So far so good, but 1 hiccup. Upon installing this lock on the basement door, it won't auto-lock, because it says "Lock Jammed" every time it is unlocked. Only pushing the lock button by hand re-locks it. Turns out this is expected, and the fix is to reprogram it as it does some kind of re-calibration cycle. My electrician has wasted hours troubleshooting this, and now I have to convince him to reprogram the lock from scratch for me, but hopefully he is willing to do this. I'd rather not drive 3 states away to do this myself. So much for me shipping things to me first. At least this got the cellular hotspot working how we wanted it.

We are going to try the Schlage Encode Smart Wi-Fi Deadbolt. We're also installing spring loaded door hinges. To communicate with it, we'll install a Netgear Nighthawk M6 mobile hotspot, inside a locked wall mounted box in the basement. This way, we can communicate with the lock and monitor and re-program it any time. I'm going to have all this equipment shipped to me, set it up, make sure it works, then ship it all to our trusted electrician who will install it on site. Hoping for the best.

I agree that the PM should handle laundry coins. I do not know the full reasoning for their refusal. I am disgruntled that it took them a month to change the door code to the laundry room. Had they changed the door code when I first asked them to, maybe this sky high water bill could have been avoided. Plus they billed me $75 labor for changing the door code. This is another reason I would prefer a remotely changeable electronic lock of some kind. This PM does a decent job handling rent and basic maintenance concerns, but they have fallen short on many areas. We chose them from a recommendation by our realtor, and they were one of the most experienced PMs at handling Section 8 tenants. However nearly every other aspect of working with them has been less than stellar. 

Regardless of what we do, we have a tenant at this property that is going through the eviction process. That tenant has got to leave before I am comfortable re-opening the laundry room again. I may hire a different contractor who I trust to install, at minimum, a better lock that locks automatically after being re-closed, and spring loaded door hinges, to increase the likelihood that it locks every time.

Not long ago, we added two sets of laundry hookups in a walk-in basement of a 4-plex, which previously did not have any laundry facilities at all. (See my post from several months back). That project is done. The property only has 1 water meter for the entire building, but we added a dedicated water heater, pump grinder, and electric panel for the basement utilities. We live out of state from the property, and our property management company said they would not be willing to empty out and deposit coins from coin based machines. So our options for machines were:

1. Purchase machines that could handle credit card or non-coin payment. (This is very expensive, probably would be 9-10k for 4 machines plus monthly cost of internet connection and credit card service)

2. Lease machines from a laundry room company willing to do this. (I have called about a dozen in the area who all told me no, due to this only being a 4 unit property)

3. Buy regular machines, and move on.

We chose option 3. We spent about 4k on new commercial grade, but non-coin machines that just work. 

For the basement door, our property management company installed a electronic keypad door with an access code. We mailed letters to the tenants saying the laundry room was complete, and what the code was, and not to share the code, and that the laundry room was not to be used by non-residents. This lasted about 3 months. The whole neighborhood it seems, was using the washers and dryers down there last month. Not surprisingly, our water bill quintupled in June from where it had been before. So, our property manager changed the door code, locked it, and no one has been in there ever since. We clearly need to figure out another strategy.

I went back to looking for leased machines, and am having no luck. CSC, Caldwell & Gregory are two companies in the area that could do leases of coin/card machines but not for a 4 plex. 

So I am wondering if it makes more sense to invest in a better door lock situation, or to invest in card-based machines? The problem with our electronic keypad door is that it is not easy to change the code without a human standing there, and it does not lock automatically. We obviously would benefit from a more robust lock of some kind. I don't want to use a traditional key lock, because if we have to have a contractor visit the basement, that creates challenges. The basement houses 4 water heaters, 1 for each apartment. So keypad locks are convenient. 

An ideal lock would have separate codes for each tenant, and a secret master code, as well as temporary codes we can give to contractors as needed. Ideally we could see details for who is opening the lock the most frequently, and when. We should be able to change the codes remotely, at any time, without needing the help of our property management company. 

I called Simplisafe and their lock seems ok but it requires a base station, and that base station requires some sort of Wi-Fi connection. In fact, every smart lock I see on the market seems to require Wi-Fi. 

It seems wasteful to have Wi-Fi hardware installed inside a locked cabinet (i.e. cellular hotspot or local broadband), that is only there in the basement for the purpose of talking to our smart lock, but I feel like this might be the only practical solution to have immediate, live access to a smart lock for the purpose of monitoring a smart lock, but maybe that's just where technology is at. I can't find any all-in-one door locks that have a simple cellular modem built-in, or anything like that. 

I would rather spend 1k or so on upgrading the lock in the basement and keeping the existing machines secure, than spend 9k+ on credit card compatible machines, (as well as the hassle of having to get rid of / sell the old machines first, and pay monthly for an internet connection and credit card service.) 

I am open to any feedback. What would you do in this situation, and if you have recommendations for door locks (high tech or low tech,) I am all ears. Thank you.

My wife are relatively new to investing, but last year, we dove in. One of our properties is a 4-plex in the Birmingham, AL area. It was built in the late 1970s, is a 2-up 2-down with an unfinished basement. The basement is accessible from the driveway via a door, so anyone can easily access the basement if they know the lock code. This property has no washers or dryers in any of the units, and it would be difficult to retrofit hookups into the units. We would like to add washer and dryer service to the basement. I am trying to decide the best way to do this.

The layout of the electrical and pluming: Each unit has its own electric meter, but there is only 1 water meter. We pay the water bill. Each unit has its own electric water heater (4 total) sitting in the basement, each water heater's electric is fed by each unit's separate meter. There's a dead bulb on the basement ceiling but it's unclear which of the 4 electric meters it is being fed from. There is no common / owner electric meter (yet), and no exterior lighting of any kind.

On one wall is a water line. I am not sure whether it is cold only, or both hot and cold, (or hot, which heater feeds it). In the distant past, this was used for a washing machine. But there is no drain line. There is also no hookup for a dryer anywhere. My best guess is that in the distant past, a washer was down there with a hose running outside to drain. This is not going to happen again on my watch. There are neighbors down the hill, and I won't allow gray water to freely flow to anyone's property. The residents seem to think that I (the owner) need only to put a washer and dryer in the basement and it will magically work. They are mistaken, but I would like to find out how to do this right for them, both to enhance their quality of life, and to enhance the value of the property.

My preferred plan is to install 2 sets of coin operated washers and dryers. This is going to require a new electric meter and breaker box, as well as a separate water heater. The sewer line sits overhead in the basement, and so I was told a pump needs to be installed to facilitate the washer's drain line going up into the sewer line. 

Another plan that was proposed by our property management company was to install 4 separate laundry rooms in the basement with plywood walls, and 4 sets of hookups, each getting hot water and electrical from each unit's respective water heater and electric meter. Put doors and locks on each room, and if a tenant wants their own washer and dryer, they can purchase it and install it and be given a key to their laundry room. This keeps it more fair to operate, but I do not like the idea of the tenant bringing their own washer, mainly due to the possibility of problems from their machines flooding, or worse. But it would at least prevent the need for a common electric panel and water meter. The challenge with doing this is the cost of having 4, not just 2 hookups.

I have called a dozen or more area plumbers. So far, only one has shown up and given a quote of $15k for ONLY the plumbing aspect of the job. This was high apparently because of the drain pump, as well as the need to trench into the concrete foundation. I haven't dissected this quote very much. I would like at least get a couple more quotes first. This quote was for plan #1 (2 hookups). So I imagine if the plumber carried out plan #2 it would be significantly more expensive. 

I am curious if anyone reading this has done a project like this before? What (if anything) did you decide to do in the basement? What is involved in adding drains and drain pumps? Thoughts are welcome, and thank you in advance.

@Dave Foster Thank you very much. We do file joint tax returns. Let's say that hypothetically, the bank does not want to include me on the $100k mortgage, because of a lack of income history. They only approve my wife to get that mortgage. At that stage, is it possible to utilize the $200k funds from my 1031 exchange as down payment on that note? Or would there need to be a separation where the $200k 1031 money is kept in my name, and the $100k mortgage is kept in my wife's name?

Then, years later when we sell, is it a problem that the names and ownership is split, or could a single 1031 exchange be done, treating us as one entity? If the latter, would it matter which name is used for selling and buying?

Good morning. I am trying to work out how a 1031 exchange would work when things are in different spouses' names. My wife and I have a CPA and 1031 Intermediary involved here, but they are both on vacation for the next few days. In the mean time, I have done some research, and also thought I would post here for advice.

I'll frame my question as a hypothetical, since I'd rather not openly share every aspect of the transaction we are about to undertake. I also hope the answers given can help others.

Let's say I own a property under my name alone, and I want to sell it via a 1031 exchange. The earnings from the relinquished property will be $500k. Let's say that I use the funds to buy two properties:

1 $300k property bought in full with $300k cash from 1031 exchange

1 $300k property for $200k cash from 1031 exchange, and $100k from a mortgage.

Due to various problems, let's say I am unable to get a $100k mortgage for the second property, but instead, my wife takes out that mortgage. I've done a lot of reading on this problem, and it sounds like it is possible for me to own 2/3 of the property, and my wife own 1/3 of the property. (Correct me if that is a wrong assumption.) 

Now, let's assume that after 5 years, we have paid down half of the principal of the mortgage, so only $50k is still owed. We decide to sell the second property, and it sells for $400,000. How can we do this via another 1031 Exchange? Would it need to be done to where only 2/3 of the sale of the second property's earnings is "shielded" from capital gains? Or, is it possible to put both of our names jointly on the entire property before the sale? I would like to do this in a way that as much as possible of the gains from these sales is protected from capital gains taxes, so if anyone has advice on how to do that, it would be appreciated. 

I understand that the "best" solution to this problem might be to get the original property in both of our names from the start. However, that is time prohibitive, since the property is about to hit the market soon, so we must deal with working this out with the resulting purchased properties. If anyone needs to know, we are located in Texas.

Thank you very much!