All Forum Posts by: Curt Bixel

I closed on a property on Thursday.  It is a duplex and comes with tenants.  I purchased the property under the understanding that one of the tenants was currently living in a hotel and escrowing their rent due to the property failing inspections by the city.  This had happened when the tenant called the city after the owner refused to address issues.  

I have contacted the tenant and learned the following:

• Their are 4 months of rent in escrow for a total of $3200
• The tenant is actually still occupying the property
• They had just cause for calling the city

I am curios what the legal aspects are pertaining to the escrowed rent.  This is new territory for me.  Right now, the different possibilities I see are:

• The previous owner may actually have claim to 100% of this money, as they owned the property during the time this rent was escrowed.  
• I may have claim to 100% of this money, once I have remedied all code violations.
• The tenant may have claim to 100% of the money for each month the property had significant code violations.

My real estate investor self would say that I should take 100% of the escrowed rent if it is my legal right to do so.  My "teacher and nice guy" side would want to give 100% of the escrowed rent to the tenant, as they need it more than me, and I didn't even own the property at that time.

My teacher and nice guy side wins out most of the time in these situations, but I certainly don't want to give $3200 to the tenant and then find out later that have to send and additional $3200 to the previous owner.  

Thank you all for your input.  I have found a property manager with a lot of experience in situations like this.  I plan to work with them to get this property where it should be.  That may well involve having the current occupants move out.  My first step would be to see if I can provide them with enough cash so that they can move out and find a new and better place.  Then I can concentrate on rehab.  

I am looking for a property management company that is willing to work in Franklinton.  :)

I am looking for recommendations for a property management company that has experience working in the Franklinton area of Columbus, Ohio.

The property is not in great shape, and I have the resources to improve it, but not the time to manage the process myself.

Greg, I will try to be more clear for you.  I believe this was a group of previously homeless people who vound their way into the place and are now staying there without a lease.  There is no electricity in the place.  

There is a duplex I am interested in purchasing wholesale.  I am pretty sure one side of the duplex is currently occupied by homeless people. 

I wonder what sort of different options there are in this situation.  

Yeah, I have asked for the first bid to be broken down to line items.  This bid was generated from BuilderTrend.  Does anyone know if BuilderTrend could generate a more granular estimate than this?

I am interested in some feedback.  I am a long time landlord and have typically done most of the work on properties myself.  I am currently thinking about purchasing and fully rehabbing a property, but it is a large enough project that I am getting bids from general contractors. 

The property is currently gutted, and the plumbing and electrical have both been roughed in, and framing has been done, so the scope of work is pretty clear and does not really leave much room for decisions about what should be completed and what should not be completed.

The first bid came in at $67,000 and the second one came in at $119,000.   Both are for rental grade finishes and both involve pulling all necessary permits with the city.  I am not sure what to make of this.  I will post both bids below, with names redacted.