All Forum Posts by: Carl Miller

This is a long question and needs the advice of a CPA and an attorney experienced in partnerships. I would make the same suggestion as @George Mastrosavas to be very careful when investing with family members. Get everything written down and evaluate whether your family relationship can withstand a business relationship.

@Wayne H. Without knowing your situation, I’m going to just suggest that the first step out of the situation is not additional borrowing.

I’d say call the bank and tell them what you’re trying to do to remedy the payments situation and ask for some help. Then work on your personal budget and get your income situation sorted. How you got into this hole is not important. What’s important is that you take control of the situation now. I’m not judging you; I’ve been where you are. It’s terrifying and it forced me to reevaluate my personal priorities. But with faith, work, and humility, you can get back on solid footing.

I’m a big believer in ditching consumer debt a la Dave Ramsey. It’s not an easy row to hoe but the peace of mind is worth every sacrifice you make.

Pros: None that I can see.
I'm not seeing the upside to this transaction. It sounds like you're trying to complicate what should be a straight refi of your personal residence. Do you expect the private investor to lend you money at a lower rate than a bank?

Cons: Transaction costs. Headache. 

I think you should revisit the "why" of this transaction.

Great explanation, Mike. I was just having this conversation with a client yesterday and didn't explain it half so well.

To answer this question, you should probably provide additional information such as how many owners there are, where the properties are located, your resident state, and the amount of equity in your properties. This question is too generic for a specific answer. There are also a lot of different opinions about the value of using business entities some people will tell you that every property should have it's own entity and others will say that entity creation is money-making scheme for lawyers.

@Henry Lazerow I don’t mind tats as a moral issue. I do find them visually distracting though. My experience with tats is similar to my experience with a friend. This friend had a disfiguring accident happen to his face when he was young which cost him his lower jaw and most of his tongue and required extensive surgery to patch up. When we first met, it was difficult to get past the visual effect and to understand his words. As we got to know each other, I got accustomed to understanding him and the visual distraction faded away.

Other people may not notice the tats at all. For me, tats are as visually distracting as my friend’s injury. When a person has tats and is talking to me, I have a hard time focusing on the person and not on their arms. That’s just how my brain works. I have plenty of friends with tats and after a while, I don’t notice them any more but initially, my ears want to listen but my eyes keep interrupting.

Please don’t take this as a character judgment. I suspect I’m not the only person for whom tats are distracting. It’s just easier to pay attention if they’re either not there or are covered. If that makes me a difficult person, I guess I just have to live with that.

Just to restate your facts, Dad is the only one on the deed and he passed. Daughter is living in the house. I didn't see anything about other heirs It doesn't sound like there's a mortgage on the property. I'm not your attorney and I'm not a WI attorney.
Based on Colorado law, it sounds like the property is going to have to go through probate to pass the title. If it's worth any money, you probably won't be able to do a small estate affidavit if that's even an option in WI. I don't know what WI adverse possession time limits are but adverse possession would probably still require a quiet title action which is going to require a court decision.
You might be able to do an informal probate (cheaper and quicker but it's still going to go through the courts). If the property is really as good as you think, you might offer to pay for the probate action with a contract with Daughter agreeing to sell the house and reduce the selling price by the cost of probate.
I understand your motivation to get it without probate but I think you're going to open a big can of worms down the road. I see some serious red flags here.

@Dean S. For the registered agent, you need someone to be available to receive service of process, i.e. legal papers in the event of a lawsuit during regular business hours. They don’t have to act as an attorney in that capacity. If you list your dog, Fido, and give an address in the middle of a lake, things will go badly for you in the case.

As a manager of the company, that gives you decision making authority but again, you don’t need to act as an attorney.

If you have someone at the front desk of your office, they can act as the agent. I serve as the RA for some of my clients. One big reason that you don’t want to name yourself as RA and list your home as the location for service is a privacy issue. That information is going to be listed with the Secretary of State and you don’t want process servers showing up at your house.

I second @Ashish Acharya. I don't know how many clients I've had come in with a sizeable loss only find out that the mortgage repayment is supposed to be a balance sheet entry and not on the P&L. You should have an amortization schedule in your loan paperwork that shows the portion of the monthly payment that is for loan repayment. If not, you can make an amortization schedule in your favorite spreadsheet software and that will get you pretty close the number for monthly loan repayment. If you make additional mortgage payments, that's going to mess with the original amortization schedule so you may want to make your own schedule anyway.

Hi Brittany,

I'm located in Denver but I have clients in the Springs and I'm down there fairly regularly. If you and your husband would like to talk, I'd be happy to schedule an initial consultation with you.

Carl