All Forum Posts by: Erod R.

hi, I own a building that has a commercial store on the ground floor and apartments on top.  i am new renting commercial store and have the following questions

1. do i need to get a rental permit for a commercial store? i know for residential apartments you have to but not sure about store since tenant doesnt live there

2. if a tenant on a commercial store stops paying rent,  do i have to follow the same process to evict that tenant? for example, give written notice, taking to court and do the eviction.  from what i heard, I can tell him to leave but if he/she doesnt then i can change the locks on the door and ask to leave and so on

i would appreciate someone sharing any info related to questions above.  my property is located in Philadelphia,PA. thanks 

Hi All,

I owe a building in Philadelphia, PA which is zone as mixed used commercial.  on file, the building is classify as 8 units(2 stores on ground floor and 6 apartments on top). there is an attic with high enough ceilings and i would like to convert the attic into two apartments or maybe one apartment.  there is enough space for either one.  someone told me the attic cannot be converted to living space in Philadelphia but I dont know if that is true.  anyone have experience with this in Philadelphia?  if yes, please share what is the process for converting the attic into living space?  the legal way of course.

yes, i thought the same but he said his wife has a regular job where she hold a title of director.  of course, i will need to validate that. her job will be the backup income in case they cannot pay with the money  from the business. i asked him to show proof of w2,paystud from that job etc and he said he will  to provide the proof.  do you think this will good enough or should i stay away?

hi everyone,

I am the owner of a small commercial building.  it has two store fronts on the ground floor and residential apartments on second and third floor.  i am currently renting one of the store and found a potential tenant.  the potential tenant was honest and told that his credit is bad because of student loans he was not able to pay. however, his wife is a director of a company that deal with children and has better credit.  they both wants to setup a daycare since she has the knowledge.  the husband mentioned that because of his low credit he can compensate by paying six month in advance plus last month and security deposit.  he said he has money to pay in advance and he got the money from some lawsuit he won.  

 if i decide to go ahead and rent to him and wife , im planning to   ask him to do the following:

- fill out rental application

- $30 fee for background criminal records

- proof of insurance for the business

- proof of wife license that permits her to work with children

- proof of income from job to ensure they can pay rent even if business not  making money

i read in the internet to watch out for those people who wants to pay in advance because they wont pay eventually.  not sure how true this is because when i was in college i was paying in advance(3 months at a time) and always pay my rent after advance payments expired.

what do you guys think?  have anybody experience  something like this? do you think this could be a potential bad tenant? etc etc

let me know whats your opinion on this

Hi Everybody,  

i am doing rehab on a building i bought in philadelphia, pa. the building has 3 floors where the first floor is  a store, 2nd floor there are two studios and 3 floor also two studios.  i only see one water tank on the basement for the store but not sure if previous owner remove the others for the studio apartments.  i have a contractor doing the renovation and he was thinking of putting the water tank on each apartment in a small closet.

i seen this before but i am concern that if the tank breaks or leaks then a lot of water may go other apartments and damage them. contractor said you can check them for corruption once in a while etc.  my question is:  should water tank be place in the basement or is it safe to have them in the apartment?  by having them in basement, contractor say it may cost additional $3000(maybe little more) because you have to run the lines, additional material and so on.  

hi Tim, i can see online that the property is classified as C2 which i believe the city of philadelphia reclassify c2 as CMX2.  the neigborhood properties are also C2(cmx2) i believe

Hi All,

I own a small building in philadelphia, PA which has a small store in the first floor, 2 studios in the second and 2 studios in the third floor.  The building is zone as commercial mix use and it is in a commercial area.  i bought the building in bad condition and hire someone to do the renovation.  at the end of the day, i fired that person because i was not happy with the job he was doing and was stealing money supposedly for the materials.  

This person converted the store into a regular apartment without my permission. he built a regular kitchen (stove, fridge, cabinets etc),  a regular bathroom(shower, toilet ,sink) and added sheet rock to divide the living room and a bedroom.  the store now looks like a regular apartment.  there is no windows in the bedroom and the only windows is in the living room which is the glass windows you see in the stores.  you cannot open and close. there is two doors, one the front door and one door that will lead to the backyard and outside of the building from the back.

please note that i did not change the zoning. it is still zone as commercial property.  my questions is as follow: under the Philadelphia landlord and tenants law, can i rent this so called apartment as a residential apartment?  i am not sure what the laws are but i read online you can use commercial property as residential without changing the zoning but not other way around.  also, i heard that in order to be a legal rental apartment, bedroom has to have windows that can be open and close.

let me know if i can rent the converted store as an apartment without getting in trouble with the law. thanks in advance

ok great. thank you Nicole and everyone else who contributed. i will talk to PM about this and i will not shut down water to avoid more problems.  

Thank you everyone. there are a lot of good input here.  however, i dont understand why utilities company can shut down electricity for example if tenants dont pay and us landlord can not do the same for hot water.   as i mentioned earlier, i am not shutting down the whole water system. just the hot water for the non payment tenant which based on your input it is illegal.    i will try some of your suggestions but then again i dont know if you can evict someone for not paying the water they agreed to  if they still pay the rent. 

i am not sure how the PM is billing them but he tells me that he sent a copy of the water bill along with what each tenant needs to pay based on the sub meter reading.  tenants seems to ignore the bill most of the time and pay something very few time.  it seems hard to collect from them even after billing them.  maybe only options is to evict them as breach of contract as some of you suggest. 

Hi Nicole,  

yes, they are paying rent on time but they are behind on the water bill.  my PM is trying to work with them to get them to pay.  PM is enforcing the rule but tenants are not paying. he is willing to evict them if they dont pay but would like to try to solve the problem first as eviction and getting new tenant takes some time.  

i was under the impression that it was legal  if the lease say you have to pay the water then hot water will be shutdown if you dont pay.  if it is illegal to do this, then i guess there is no other choice to evict them for nonpayment as they will be breaking the lease even though they are paying the rent.