All Forum Posts by: Carlos Varum Jr

During the winter, I think about how to better monetize wasted spaces in our properties and was thinking about the same thing at one of our properties here in Providence. 

We have done storage rooms in many of our buildings. We save our left over doors from apartment renovations, frame up a doorway and walls out of 2x4's, and OSB plywood the walls to create privacy for the storage rooms. For $25-$40 you have a storage room that we rent out for $25 per month for tenants. This would be the best ROI although, but may not be the best cashflow option.

The house that I have been thinking a lot about is built on a road that is on a hill so one side has small basement windows, but the other side has big enough window openings for egress. I don't have enough land to change the use (occupancy) without going in front of zoning (which equals $$$), so I cannot add another apartment. 

So what we are considering is creating a stairway from the apartment above, down into the basement for 1 or 2 more bedrooms with a hallway, and a back door (2nd form of egress from basement) that leads to the existing basement stairs and out. We could probably get another $1000/month in rent, but we are looking at $50,000-$60,000 in work to move 2 heating systems, create a stairway, frame, fire rate and finish. 

So far less ROI them storage rooms, but long term better cashflow.