All Forum Posts by: Account Closed

Sorry to hear about your situation.  It did happen to me (stabbing- wife killed husband), and the previous post was spot on.  In my case, the unit was released to me in 2 days since it was a pretty open and shut case.  One warning for you- any mess from the crime (i.e. blood) will be yours to clean up. On tv, there is a nice clean chalk outline on the floor where the body was.  In real life, or at least in my case, what was left was a room carpet with a sort of body shaped pc cut out of the middle and a lot of dried blood that was emotionally very difficult for me to take care of.  And then there is the lasting legacy (tenants love to talk.....)

this question is so insane, I'm wondering if this is a joke

just my 2 cents- do not spend money treating adjoining units unless you know that the problem has spread. Bedbugs  are not like roaches-they will not move to another unit unless the infestation is really bad (this did happen to me once), and you do not want to start a panic in the building.

They tend to stay where the food is (the tenant).  I have had 4 different cases of bedbugs- all treated effectively with chemicals, not the expensive heat method. All were treated with a 3 step method over several weeks. In all 4 cases, there were no more signs of the critters (or their bites) after just the first visit. I have gone from being frantic with fear over the thought of having a bedbug reporting, to having it be just another maintenance issue to be dealt with.  It is always the tenant's fault (except the time they did spread from above, which we discovered because the tenant's lifestyle was so inconsistent with a bedbug problem that we looked elsewhere and found the problem immediately), and it's always been (for me, anyway) much more inconvenient for the tenant than it was for me. 

@Brent Coombs- I guess its personal preference when you get right down to it, Brent. I find a combination of it being much easier to buy (30 settlements vs 1 settlement), manage (30 different addresses vs 1 building, 30 insurance policies vs 1 policy, 30 spring roof inspections vs 1 roof...), and yes, economies of scale ($850/yr insurance on my SFH vs $7k on the building) makes Multis more attractive to me than all SFHs. It was much much quicker and easier to acquire the volume that I needed to retire myself from the 9 to 5 doing the Multis. The other problem with the SFHs is appreciation. Not much you can do over the years to force any more than the local comps are going to give, no matter how much rents go up. Multis are just the opposite. That will be my ultimate meal ticket. It's not all about profit/door, it's about total IRR, and how much trouble it is to get there.

@Brent Coombs Hi Brent- the limiting factor in the per door profitability on Multis is cap rate. In an area where you could buy a SFH for 60k, and get $1,250/mo rent, that is because the sales price wasn't tied to current rental value, it was based on local comps of (probably) mostly owner occupied houses. Multis, priced in direct relation to potential income (cap rate), and will hardly allow you to get a spread such as SFHs. Your money is made on volume, and economies of scale. At least, that's the way it works for me.

Hope that helps. 

You have hit the nail on the head. Profits per door should be less on larger multi family, but so are the costs {economies of scale). I currently roughly $4-500/door on my SFH, and only $2-300/door on my multis. Spoiler alert: I make A LOT more money on my multis because of economies of scale.

Actually, rental real estate makes money in 5 ways:

1. cash flow

2.appreciation

3. mortgage paydown

4. depreciation

5. leverage (try buyinng stocks, bonds, or gold at 20% / 80%)

Phillip- my concern after reading your question is your lack of awareness of the actual current financial status of your holdings.  You will never know if you are actually making money unless you track your income/expenses per property (I use Rentec). You should know, to the dollar, what your cash flow is for each property at any time during the year.  If one of your properties is misbehaving, financially speaking, the numbers will tell the tale.  As the pattern becomes clear that you have a stinker in the group (sometimes a unit just doesn't perform for one reason, or several), you can shed that unit and move on.

  If you are going to succeed at this game, 

 "I currently make about 550 cash flow per property, but after you figure maintenance/repairs, it's probably 300 per month per unit" 

 will not cut it.

Although I'm not sure how I feel about the original question posed here, I do know that it's NEVER easier to evict someone than it is to just disqualify them up front for any suspicion you may have about them.

Apparently, I was incorrect above on the need for certification of a service animal. Actually, those who are quick to produce "certification" for their supposed service animal are most likely the fraudster since certification is not required. However, I was correct on my other points.  From the ADA website:

A service animal is any dog that is individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of an individual with a disability, including a physical, sensory, psychiatric, intellectual, or other mental disability. Other species of animals, whether wild or domestic, trained or untrained, are not considered service animals.

The work or tasks performed by a service animal must be directly related to the individual’s disability. Examples of work or tasks include, but are not limited to:

• assisting individuals who are blind or have low vision with navigation and other tasks
• alerting individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing to the presence of people or sounds
• providing non-violent protection or rescue work
• pulling a wheelchair
• assisting an individual during a seizure
• alerting individuals to the presence of allergens
• retrieving items such as medicine or the telephone
• providing physical support and assistance with balance and stability to individuals with mobility disabilities
• helping individuals with psychiatric and neurological disabilities by preventing or interrupting impulsive or destructive behaviors

The crime deterrent effects of an animal’s presence and the provision of emotional support, well-being, comfort, or companionship are not considered work or tasks for purposes of the definition of a service animal.

Asking questions

To determine if an animal is a service animal, a public entity or a private business may ask two questions:

• Is this animal required because of a disability?
• What work or task has this animal been trained to perform?

Also, I learned that an animal that misbehaves, disturbs or toilets can be removed from a public place even if it is an actual "service" animal.  One way to determine if an animal is an actual trained service animal is to observe it's behavior. A trained service animal should not appear restless, should obey it's handlers commands immediately, and should sit or lie passively when not being asked to perform it's trained function.