All Forum Posts by: Chris John

@Carlos Ptriawan

Sorry, man.  Bummer!

@Carlos Ptriawan

I learned this the hard way.  The worst part for me was that these were in the attics of one-floor 4plexes.  Why not put them on the ground?!?!?!  So frustrating.

I hope you didn't just learn this the hard way!

It's all at 3-4%.  I borrowed until the banks stopped me when rates were low.  

I think @Scott Trench brings up a great point when he says "Many investors who don't know what that inflection point is will continually leverage thirsting for more, and ultimately wish they’d listened to Dave", but I plan on borrowing until the grave if the numbers make sense for my children and grandchildren.

Haha.  I owe like 30x my annual salary.

@Ashton A. Moore

I see.  I really think the other stuff on your list is extremely negligible.  Assuming your inspector did his job and he didn't miss anything major, this (and maybe the moisture) would be the only things I'd want to have looked into.  If you are happy with the deal otherwise, I'd just get an HVAC company over there for an inspection (should be reasonable), explain the situation, and ask them to verify correct installation of the unit, etc.  If everything but the intake checked out, I'd ask them (or your handyman on the other little jobs) if you can give them an extra $50-100 bucks to make a cheap, screw-in plate of some sort for the filter.  They'd be making a tidy profit at that price, imo.  It should take 5 minutes and $3-5 for them.

I find the intake/filter thing VERY odd.  Especially for a new unit.  I'd be way more concerned about larger issues with the system.  If there aren't any, I think getting a filter on that thing is a chip shot.  You could honestly even make it look decent if you cared enough to.

If you proceed, I'd love an update.  You've got my curiosity.

Best wishes!

@Ashton A. Moore

Weird.  Well, honestly, who knows how much serviceable time that thing has left anyway?  If that's the intake, I'd just jigger something up with self-tapping screws and clips.  It doesn't have to be art since it's most likely in a closet anyway and it won't take much to keep the filter covering that hole with the help of gravity.

If you are planning on relying on that system for an extensive period of time though, I'd probably get it inspected by an HVAC professional.  It'll probably come back with a less than glowing report which you can use to negotiate the price.  If you think you're unlikely to get anything back from negotiating further and are expecting to replace the HVAC when it goes, I'd do the self-tapping screws and clips...

@Bruce Woodruff

You can book hotels, planes, rental cars, etc.  You can get cash back instead (although the travel is a higher multiplier on your points), have your points pay your credit card bill, etc.  It's been an insane eye opener for me.  It literally seems too good to be true, but a quote I remember seeing was that the credit card companies are willing to lose millions to make billions.  Anyway, my credit score is still over 800, so there hasn't been too much fall out.  Again, I swear I'm not getting paid by them!

Although, let me know if you need a referral link to get you started (as part of the scheme is having my wife and myself refer cards to each other for those bonuses too). 

;)  haha

I suspect this isn't what you're looking for and I promise I'm not a shill, but my coworker turned me onto travelfreely.com.  It's a website that keeps track of which cards you should be adding and subtracting to maximize the bonus points while still keeping your credit score high.

My wife and I have been doing it for about 6 months and probably have gotten about $5K of free travel already.  I suspect we'll get $8-10k of travel a year while putting around $4-5k a month or so on our cards that we pay off each month.  It's honestly kinda nuts how quickly the bonuses accrue and how organized the site keeps you.  I've also added a spreadsheet for me to help me with a little extra organization.

Anyway, I highly recommend it as it's easily a net positive and takes almost no time.  The website even emails you reminders when it's time to add or cut a card.

I agree with all of the fixes being cheap and easy (except for potentially the moisture), but am I the only one confused by this:

"- No air filter and nowhere to place one on HVAC"

What does this mean?  The HVAC doesn't filter air?  

@Wesley Leung

In my opinion (and I know what that's worth), your tone isn't really normal for biggerpockets.  I'd save this for twitter, reddit, or whatever.  @Carlos Ptriawan is a gem on these boards and deserves more respect, even if you don't like his answers or agree with him. 

I've never participated in a syndication (and probably never will), but are the syndicators that follow through and produce for their investors also scammers?  Or just those that come up short?  I mean, I guess I'm asking if you can imagine a world in which they thought the investment would come good or do you think they were cynical from the get?