All Forum Posts by: CJ Ashton

Ceramic.  It's holding up just fine.

@Paul Ronto,

Holy cow.  5 month notice of intent to renew or not?  I thought 30 day notice was standard practice and I was getting greedy asking for 45 days.

I'm a fan of the "open house" method while it is still occupied by current tenant.  I ask the current tenant for 1 to 2 hours and advertise heavily.  I've always been able to find the next qualified tenant through this method and the vacancy is at most a couple of weeks and sometimes as little as a couple of days.

I'm a fan of the wood-like tile.  Looks good.  Holds up nicely.

Something else to consider if you have the spare space...  I have an extra appliance or two in my garage.  In a pinch, it's sometimes easier (and cheaper) to replace the whole unit with a used appliance rather than pay for a service call and repair.

I only manage a couple of properties so take my $0.02 for what it's worth.

I always have my service providers call the tenant and schedule directly with them.  That way, the tenant is responsible for managing their own schedule and any delay in the problem getting repaired is on them.  I've found that most service providers have fairly flexible schedules and can get the job done in a time that is convenient for the tenant's work schedule.

Just on a raw numbers basis, I would go with the 20% down to avoid the PMI. The PMI is lost money that you'll never get back. In theory, you'll eventually get back all of your down payment at sale or through refinance.

This article contends that the upward march of rent prices we've been seeing for the last few years may be tapering.  Anecdotally, it seems a ton of new supply is coming on in the South East Metro Phoenix Area (Gilbert, Chandler).  It seems like everywhere I look there are huge apartment complexes being built.

To a certain degree, I would expect some of this downward pressure to spill over into the single-family market.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/another-part-real-e...

Danger, Will Robinson! Danger!

This really depends on your specific market.  If the potential tenant has other possibilities that have parking and W/D, you'll have to lower your rent to make up for those two things.  If I were the tenant, these would be big deal to me personally.  But, there may be a segment of the renting population out there that doesn't care about parking or in unit W/D.

@Brian H.

3. We love direct deposit.  We manage 4 properties.  We use Cozy.co for 2 of them.  One wanted to use her bank directly (formerly ClearXchange, soon to be zelle).  I have one holdout that uses cashier's checks because he doesn't have a bank account.  You'd be surprised at how annoying it is to have to make a trip to the bank once you've gone electronic with your other tenants.  While it takes a while for Cozy payments to deposit, that has the slickest interface.  Going forward, we plan to include language that there will be an extra charge for payments made by means other than electronically.

4. We manage a condo and there are only 2 designated spaces for that unit. They are welcome to park more on the street. This really depends on the HOA/Condo rules and the size of the unit. For example, the SFH that we manage has a 2 car garage and space for 2 more vehicles on the driveway before you have to park on the street.

6. Not sure what you would need to do to a washer/dryer to make the use "unreasonable".  I guess if someone ran a laundry business out of the unit.  This has never been an issue for me so we don't include any language in our lease about it.

9. We specify the cost of replacing dead or missing bulbs in the lease and charge their deposit accordingly.  I don't have a  lease in front of me so I don't know exactly, but we are reasonable and don't use replacing bulbs as a profit making venture.