All Forum Posts by: Chris Mills

Hi all,

I have 3 small cleaning companies that I use regularly spread across over a dozen STR homes. Each has put in bids for what they will charge for each property after a guest stay. One has sent higher invoices than usual recently after particularly messy guests. She's just deciding what she want's to charge at this point. I would like to establish a pre-determined increase for those messy guests and require pictures, etc., I'm just having a hard time deciding what that increase would be. I'd like to keep it simple, like a flat fee or percentage that I can apply to all 3 companies and all the homes of all different sizes in the case of a difficult cleaning situation so we're not negotiating after the fact. Thoughts?

I would lean toward keeping it as a rental as well. If PITI comes out to $2,000 or less with the higher taxes, I'd say it's a keeper.

@Sapir Simply as @Henry Lazerow mentioned, I think you could benefit a good deal from catering to your Hebrew culture. The ethnic biases in the US are real, but you can lean into it and benefit. Use your background, the simple/simplicity of doing transactions with you, even the sapphire blue color in your marketing. It'll endear you to a lot of people and make them cheerleaders for you. Those who it turns off, you don't need em. Neutralizing yourself is a bad idea, because no one has a reason to use you at that point. You want to stand out, not blend into the sea of agents in your market.

Unless it's a forever hold, I wouldn't touch a condo. Condo docs, condo fees, the condo association telling you what you can and can't do, and all the appreciation issues already mentioned make it a last resort. If there's another reason to buy it, like sending your kid to college or something, so be it. But there are too many other, better, places to put capital and energy these days than condos.

I agree with @Jonathan R McLaughlin. Putting it back on the market twice may be hurting you almost as much as being overpriced. And you are overpriced. If you're not getting offers in this market, you're overpriced. Look at current comps, realistically, and then price competitively. Your DOM lost you the opportunity to push the envelope on what you can get for the house. Unfortunately, now you have to price competitively to what has sold in the neighborhood, not what's on the market.

You can send it to me as well. Happy to take a look.

@Maggie Blackburn If that $100 is after a percentage (2-5%) is set aside for maintenance, then yes, I'd say you're good.

@Maggie Blackburn You don't just want to aim to break even. Always build in a bit of cushion for yourself. Generally speaking, the newer you are to investing, the more cushion you'll want to build in for mistakes and unforeseen circumstances. Based on those general numbers, you may want to pivot to a market with better margins. They're out there.

@Mark Dawson I don't know where this property is, and what the comps are, but the numbers will likely tell you what to do. Even if you had the cash sitting around, you'd be into this property for a total of $166k. Is it worth that or more once the work is done? What rent would the market command when the property is in that condition? If it's worth $200k+, go ahead and flip it and take your cash. If not, you can rent it out once it's in the proper shape to do so. Those are the missing numbers currently as I see it.

You don't want to rent it out without fixing it up, and probably fixing the roof. The tenant you'd get in it's current state would not be a desirable one, and you'd be surprised how much worse shape they'd leave it in. Not worth the headache. 

A lot of investors, myself included, know whether we've screwed up or not at the closing table. I would ask these questions and run these numbers before I spent sixty thousand dollars, but I don't speak for everyone.

@April L. I would connect with contractors in the areas you're strongly considering and ask that question. I've done both myself. Last time I bought land and built from the ground up was 2017, and from what I'm gathering now it would cost me almost double what I paid then. You're going to want to be up to speed on what building costs and buy+rehab costs are in those areas, and once you are, that may answer the question for you.