All Forum Posts by: Adrian Mata

Usually buildings that were originally built for multiple units are separately metered. Tenants take care of their own utilities.

In situations where this is not the case. Usually the house was originally built as a single family house but over time redesigned so the owner could earn some income. In those situations, you can buy thermostats where you have a master code and you can set a floor temperature and a ceiling or min and max temperature for tenants.

I'm in Indianapolis. If you provide the appliances, you're responsible for the maintenance of them.

Not a lawyer. This is not legal advice.

This would totally depend on your state's laws and whether or not they're landlord friendly. In Indiana, the only issue I could imagine would be that the tenant might have to be served in person. 

If that's not the case, then file the writ and that becomes your apartment. Here the cops and a neutral storage company will come and clear out the stuff in the apartment and put it in storage at the tenant's cost. 

In regards to the car, I don't think you have any right to it at all. I'd ask the cops what you can do to get it moved.

I'm still not a lawyer. That wasn't legal advice.

I'm not a lawer. This is not legal advice.

-Meet the tenants and talk to them in person. Tell them you'd like to put them on your lease. 

-If they say YES, then they sign and they're under your rules

-If they say NO, you have to honor the rules of the current lease. Reasons for no usually fall under time frame. Tenants typically want the flexibility and they'll look forward to the end of a lease.

If the lease is in place either way, just contact the tenants and let them know how you want to handle payments or what the new address is.

When it comes to the deposits, this can be tricky. Most owners won't want to come off the cash so they'll try to credit it to you at closing. This won't help you much since you'll still have to come up with the money. On our second deal , we communicated with the seller that we wanted a check at closing. On the closing day at the title company, we had to sign all the paperwork then the title agent left the room and the seller gave us a check. 

Not a lawyer. Not legal advice.

Here it pretty much comes down to paint and carpet.

I would charge them for the disposal since they were the ones that clogged it. On that thought I probably wouldn't even have a disposal.

Try to get the cheapest appliances possible. There are places like used appliance stores and Habitat for Humanity that have very cheap appliances.

With all that said, I am serving a fairly low income demographic. If you're owning higher rentals then a lot of that advice probably isn't applicable.

I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice.

The purpose of the "in writing" phrase is (well one of the main purposes) is in case you go to court. It depends on your state if they'll accept text messages as evidence. Believe it or not some courts don't accept outright texts unless the recipient actually says "this is _____" In that case, it wouldn't serve its purpose. I use text messaging because it's convenient. Anything official I'll call them or post a note on the door (walk through) or have a physically signed agreement

Not a lawyer and this is not legal advice.

I wish I had stumbled on a thread like this before. It totally captures the kinds of things you're going to have to deal with. I have had to deal with these issues recently.

The truth is that a person will do anything they have to to stay off the street. Sometimes they're in a bad situation (job loss, injury, whatever) and sometimes they're just being dishonest. I found that getting upset won't help the situation at all and just make things worse. The best course of action is to start the legal process as soon as you can so you can get your place back as soon as it's possible. If they can legitimately find a way to pay, they will pay.

I think there's something to be said about options and just how people work. If they can't negotiate with Verizon for their phone bill then they won't. This isn't an option to utilize for them. If they feel that they can negotiate with you about their rent then why wouldn't they? They'll see you as the slack in their financial life and they'll take advantage of it. If they can hold you off then why wouldn't they do that rather then deprive themselves or ask a family member for money?

The way they'll see it is that people can be negotiated with but companies won't be. If you think about it, in our (USA) culture, you "haggle" or negotiate with vendors at flea markets and garage sales but you don't do that at Walmart or Target. It works the same way. Some people set up a PM company or some people are just stern about their rules. Either way they don't get lax because it just leads to trouble. I have been burnt enough and I'm done "working with" people unless they needed like 2 extra weeks (one paycheck).

You don't sound mean to me. Don't go lax on rules. It an set a bad precedent. The only thing I would do is not charge them for the lockout.

 If you have good tenants, then that should be enough. If you have tenants that use the internet you could think of setting up some kind of electronic transfer like cozy.co (It is cozy.co not cozy.com). 

Best way to communicate? Try a phone call or stopping by in person. You'll need to change the furnace filters every 6 months so you'll at least be around that much. You can give them notice and stop by as well. 

I have copies of driver's licenses.

Try Investing in Apartment Buildings by Matthew Martinez

Make sure you understand the eviction process. Talk to a lawyer in the area if you need to. Trust me it's way better to know how it will work before you have to go through it.

https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/52/topics/222...

This thread was awesome. Great resource.