All Forum Posts by: Brian L.

My home purchase was seller financed. I recently extended/refinanced the note with new terms - in the new contract, the note is interest-only there's no prepayment penalty after 3 yrs but there's also no detail/language in the contract of what that prepayment penalty would be. It's been a little over a year and I'd like to refinance the interest-only note with a traditional 30yr mortgage at a lower rate. What do I do about the prepayment penalty? How do I figure out how it will be calculated?

Agh, I miscalculated. So, all told there would be 80' of wall furred out 4". Electrical would run behind the wall.

I own a 2-story mixed-use brick building that I'm currently remodeling. One of the upstairs units has walls with inconsistent and unsightly plaster/concrete covering the brick. My  contractor has advised that it would be more cost effective to simply furr out the walls and put up a nice smooth dry wall instead of trying to even out/improve the current situation. But by doing that, I'd be losing about 43sqft of area. What would you do? Will that effect the amount of rent I can charge?

I just bought a building in April w/ 4 residential units. All tenants were on month-to-month agreements under the previous ownership. All contracts expired after I took over the building. Now 2 of the 4 tenants refuse to sign the new rental agreement. I have not increased their rent -- the only thing that is different is that I will not be paying for their utilities. What are my options? The building is in L.A..

The plan is to turn the present 4 small residential units into 2 larger ones. The 4 units are currently tenant occupied. Most of the tenants are month-to-month but the place is rent controlled. One of the tenant's is apparently in violation of his lease b/c 3 other people who aren't on the lease are living in the unit. What's the best procedure to get the ball rolling with my intended plans? Do I give notice to one of the tenants since I'm entitled to live in one of the units as owner-occupier? Thanks in advance for your help.

If I were to buy a seller-financed property with the intention of refinancing it in a couple years, what's the best way to set up the payments to the seller so that my repayment history benefits my credit score?

Thanks everyone for your thoughtful responses.

Do I analyze it the same as a straight income property?