All Forum Posts by: Don Thornton

Does PM have to hire licensed vendors to take care of my property? I signed a contract with a reputable firm stating that any repairs under $250 PM need not consult me. Later I found out PM hired an unlicensed landscaper and he was rude on the phone and did not fix the leaking valve. He also will not come back to check the problem of why it's not working. PM, of course, is not addressing this issue and told me the landscaper is right. So on this grounds, can the contract be terminated between me and the PM?

Hi,

I have 2 properties month to month lease. I signed up with a new PM in Oct 2019. Tenants left and I fixed it up, put a lock on it and is currently taking charge and selling in under a listing agent. I found out recently the PM is charging me monthly fees even though they are not fixing it up nor looking after it. 

In the agreement here's what is written:

TERMINATION: This Agreement may be terminated by either party upon thirty (30) days written notice which is sent to the other party not less than thirty (30) days before any expiration date, Upon termination by Owner or expiration of this Agreement. Owner shall pay Agent all management fees which would have accrued through the end of the term of the lease, or in the event of a month-to-month tenancy, all management fees which would have accrued through the expiration of the thirty (30) days following notice of termination. 

Since my houses were on month to month lease, can the PM charge me for another year of management fees even after my house is not under their management? I have written termination of agreement notice to PM but he told me to get a lawyer to read the contract again. Am I not reading this correctly?

This company is in Las Vegas 

I checked my Property Management Agreements. They state:

1) Either party can terminate at any time with written notice of 30 days. 
2) That if I cancel they can charge me up until the end of the lease. In the case of month-to-month tenancy they get 30 days payment beyond the end of any agreement ($75 or 7%, whichever is greater).
 
Two properties were month-to-month and the third property was at the end of it's lease.  They charged me $1878.50 but were only due $267.50. They definitely overcharged me. I just wrote them a termination letter for the 3 properties and requested my money back. There is a fourth property whose lease ends in June. I'm sure they will quit me and I won't have to pay to the end of the lease on the 4th property. 

That's where things stand as of now. 

If you are using any other HONEST PMs in the Las Vegas area please contact me. I am interested in knowing the best PMs.
 

Yes both properties are vacant. I am trying to sell them now. I don't understand if I signed a contract and I am not happy with the PM's work, do I still pay even when the property is vacant? I guess I am trying to get help here to see if anyone signed a contract for 1 year term and even if they sell the property they still have to pay? If the PM did the walk-thru and found out my last tenant left the place in a mess with dog pee smell why didn't they report to me so I can kick them out earlier? They were on a month to month lease. 

Hi,

I hired a PM company here in Las Vegas and I decided to sell my property because the tenants left it in a mess. The PM continued to charge me monthly fees while I fixed up the property. He told me I signed up for 1-year term and I have to pay. The tenants left the place with pee smell and broken window and we spent over $15000 fixing the place up removing floors and repainting the whole place, a brand new dishwasher used 5 months was thrown away. PM took the safety deposit which I never got to see and he changed me monthly PM fees. He also hired a landscape guy who charged me $180 which he didn't tell me about. He said it's because any sum under $250 I don't need to know about. Now after 3 months the valve leaked again. The person who fixed the landscape doesn't have a company name. It's just some guy and the invoice is his name and a phone number. Another property the tenant destroyed the garage door by putting epoxy on it. When they left he told me I didn't pay $700 for new panels. I got another company to fix for $200. He told me to refund ALL the rental's deposit to them. Anyone of you has had these problems? How do I get out of paying this PM monthly fee if I haven't been happy with them and now I don't have any tenants? 

Hi, I am looking at a property that I am interested in but it's in another state. Since I am living in another state I have to make work arrangements before I can fly over to the property to do my due diligence. Can anyone give me advice on how to write and send over the LOI (Letter of Intent) and hold the property with downpayment before I can fly over there to do due diligence? Thank you for reading my post.

My property manager told me rentometer is not correct in telling me how much rent I should collect for my property. He said Zillow is better. What are your thoughts? Please advise.

Hi,

I have 4 small family rental properties in Las Vegas. I have no experience in managing the properties and hired 2 PM companies so far  they didn't work out. I want to ask why? The 1st one was due to an AirBNB issue. My tenants rented the entire place out on AirBNB. The city sent me (owner) a letter to remove the ad. I forwarded the letter to my PM and after 30 days he didn't deal with it. I then called the city myself and was told if the ad is not removed I will be fined $500 per night because my property is not licensed to rent out on AirBNB. I told the city employee that I wasn't the one who posted the ad and that it was my tenant, the lady on the phone told me it doesn't matter. I will be the one to get fined. I contacted AirBNB and told them I didn't approve the ad. AirBNB told me they cannot remove the ad because I didn't post the ad!!! So I contacted the PM and asked him why he didn't inform tenant to remove the ad during which he was given 30 days to deal with the matter. He told me he is busy and in court dealing with another tenant issue. He told me to not go down to deal with the tenant directly. But due to the urgency of the matter we drove down there and had a chat with the AirBNB guest. The PM was mad at us for driving down to OUR property to handle the issue ourselves. I told him I had given him (88 Realty) 30 days to deal with it. Finally the AirBNB guest wrote a review on AirBNB and AirBNB removed the ad. We were not fined $500 per night. The PM was so mad at us he fired us. Was this our fault? He also hired a roof guy to fix the roof at another one of our properties and it leaked after 3 months and the guy didn't follow up. We hired the other PM we told them about this roof issue, they tried to fix it and got vendors to go down there to get us a quote. One vendor told us we needed a structural engineer. So this issue was never taken care of because the 2nd PM firm did not follow up. 3 weeks before the lease ended for the property with the roof issue we asked the PM to update us on the lease situation. They told us tenant didn't contact them back. They also didn't mentioned the lease will end last day of Sept 2019. On 26th Sept they left a message on our phone but we were travelling for work and couldn't hear the message very clearly also at the same time our close family member died. When we got back to las Vegas the PM called us yelling ay us for not returning his phone call. He ask if the tenants can stay another 6 months? We agreed feeling pressured to make a harsh decision but he was yelling and was extremely unfriendly. Blaming us for not getting back to him. 1 day after we signed the lease the tenant complained the roof is still leaking.  We asked why they didn't inform us the lease will end lst day of Sept 3 weeks before the lease ended? He came at us and scolded us for not informing them about the roof. He told us he was never told about the roof and we hide the fact from him and it was our fault we didn't fix it. Then his wife (Cassie) asked why we don't manage the properties ourselves? We asked if they want to continue this job and they said NO. So that same day we called around and found a roofer who will fix the roof at a very reasonable rate. This was not accomplish by this 2nd PM firm (The Mor Group). So what do you think? Why do we keep having such issues with PM companies?

Looking for opinions on buying tax liens over the counter in Florida. Spoke to a guy who said he's been doing it in FL for 20 years, and always finds some deeds worth buying and rehabbing into rentals. 

Question: Does this sound correct? That there are still some decent deeds that were not purchased at auction that are worthy of purchase for rehab? He says he typically pays around $12k and then puts in some money for rehab (up to around $10k). He always buys in the same county but he says there are many many counties where this is true. He also said you could buy over the counter year-round. He pulled up a county list on his phone with about 100 or so listings. I asked him to estimate the percentage of buyable deeds on a typical list and he estimated between 5 - 10% are buyable for this purpose. 

Would anyone concur with this estimate? Any comments? I live in Nevada but am interested in Florida. Thanks!