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All Forum Posts by: Gayle Melnick

Gayle Melnick has started 9 posts and replied 78 times.

@David Pryce

If you want to buy in Columbia, your best bet would be to house hack. With a VA Loan you buy for nothing down, rent out the rooms and have your roommates pay your mortgage. It's a pricier market but the numbers would definitely work if you're house hacking.

@Samuel Mallery

You’re probably going to be repainting the interior of the house prior to moving a tenant in. You should also be thoroughly cleaning it. The biggest problem areas will be chipped or peeling paint around windows. If you don’t have that, and you clean well, you should pass.

The way the lead risk reduction inspection works is that you have to pass an exterior inspection. If there is any chipped paint anywhere, you fail and do not get to do dust samples.

If you pass the exterior inspection, the next step is dust samples. They do a dust sample from the floor of small area of each room and test that sample for lead. If the amount of lead found in that sample is above a certain threshold, you fail and have to redo that specific room only. You do not have to retest every single room if only one or two rooms fail. They don’t go around and scrape off paint on the inside and test that. It’s a small area of the ground that they test. If you make sure that your house is free of dust and debris and you use the cleaning products the EPA specifies (ie simple green) you’ll be fine.

I haven’t done the lead free inspection yet. If you go this route, you don’t have to recertify at every tenant turn. I have heard this is more expensive and can be difficult with the older homes in Baltimore city.  

@Samuel Mallery

Other Baltimore specific stuff...

Every non owner occupied property needs a rental license and lead inspection. You can get a lead free inspection or lead safe. Lead safe is easier but you need to redo it at each tenant turnover. 

To pass the lead inspection, the big items are no peeling paint on the outside. On the inside, if you have an unfinished basement you need to power wash and paint the floor  with a garage type epoxy paint in order to pass the dust sample. It should be a one time expense though. If you clean all the surfaces on the interior with simple green, you should pass the lead safe inspection.

You should get another coating on the flat roof even if you don’t see any obvious leaks. It’s pretty inexpensive.

Baltimore city sewage system is notoriously old and in bad shape. You may need to budget for replacing the main water line and the sewer line. That can be expensive.


@Samuel Mallery

The water bill goes to the owner. Put it in the lease that it’s the responsibility of the tenant to pay for water. You generate a charge with whatever system you’re using and they can pay it that way. I use avail and generate a charge on there. No issues.

You can have the tenants go on the city website and pay it directly, all you need is the address and you can look up and pay the bill. I prefer paying it myself then having the tenant reimburse me.

@Yannik Cudjoe-Virgil

Great tips, thanks for posting them!

I've only done two deals, but I have some more granular stuff to add too that I learned in my first few deals. 

1. If you have an unfinished basement, you need to power wash and paint it with a garage type epoxy paint. You're going to fail the lead safe inspection if you don't. 

2. Anything that has more than 3 steps needs a handrail.

3. Get rid of all exterior peeling paint. 

4. Put a new coat on the rubber roof even if it doesn't have a leak. It's pretty cheap to do and most properties that you'll buy from previous landlords will not have kept up on the roof maintenance. 

Anyone else have other tips?

@Ivy Hailey

I don't think there's a way to get a definite answer on rehab costs without having a contractor give you a specific bid on a specific job. You might get some that could give you a ballpark answer if you give them exact details, but any contractor I've talked to has told me that they need to look at the job in order to give an accurate estimate.

If you're looking for general estimates in order to analyze deals, J Scott's book is the best resource I've found. What I do is take the average of the range he gives for labor and materials for each item and use that as my best estimate. I've found it's been pretty close.

Post: How do I buy a 2nd property?

Gayle MelnickPosted
  • Posts 80
  • Votes 66

@Eric Daniels Your lender should be able to use the projected rental income from the second property rather than the debt to income ratio. I believe it's called the debt service coverage ratio. That's what I did when I bought my second rental. I did have to specifically ask though, because my lender initially told me my DTI wouldn't work.

@Kennesha VanBurch Did you buy the property on 29th street in Remington? Near papermoon diner? Just curious because I saw it on the market for a while and noticed it just went under contract and it seems to fit the description you're talking about.

@Jonathan Baron

There’s tons of reasons why people rent instead of buy. A young unmarried couple just moving in together is less likely to buy a house right off the bat than to try to rent for a bit. Especially if they need both of their incomes to qualify for the mortgage. It’s a much bigger commitment to buy a house together than it is to sign a year lease together. That’s just one of a multitude of reasons people rent instead of buy, even though rent is more than a mortgage payment. 

@Tyrone Marson yes I do! These photos are from the move in inspection, not the listing, so not the best quality and obviously a different style than listing photos. The photos I had for the listing were actually pre rehab. The house was in good enough shape that I could take enough photos for a listing before I even started the rehab. I actually ended up securing a tenant before the rehab was even complete so didn’t need to take listing photos after it was all done.