All Forum Posts by: Account Closed

That's where I'm at too. I am selling the house for whatever the guy will give me. I feel fortunate that I can even get rid of that house, and I told the new pm that I am not giving their company another cent. The timing couldn't be more perfect because as you know the property taxes will soon be due and I am done with cutting those kind of checks. There will never be a cash flow with the newly placed section 8 tenants because the pm keeps charging me for things that have already been done. I finally asked for pictures of all the repair work. She hasn't produced it yet. The old pm says she is honest (he's the one buying the house). But in all my 27 years of owning property, I have never seen repair bills like this before. All I know is that everything along the way has been awful, misrepresentation on rebates, unexpected bills, bad tenants, and a complete rip off from the pm. I was presented with a fairly risk free investment and it has been by far the most gut wrenching experience I ever had. I too will be very happy when I never have to think about Detroit again.

So sorry to hear of your experience. I have lost so much money in Detroit. I am in the process of selling my house. It has been a nightmare for me. I have a property manager that has double billed me, charges me at least $500 or more in repairs every month, and this is after I paid them $5,000 for a rehab because of bad tenants. The repairs don't end. I now believe that the management company is a thief. Someone took over the repair bills for me and I am selling the house to him on the 30th, loosing $25,000. I will just be so happy to be done with Detroit. I believe they take advantage of out of state investors. To all... stay away from Detroit.

Castle Rouge is near Detroit Diesel. It looks like I am on my out of Detroit! I am trading properties with my son, which puts me right where I belong, near home. :) Hopefully he will have a positive experience with Detroit. He has a great start with a very qualified property manager. I know I wouldn't have been able to handle what Jeremy Burgess has gone through with section 8.
http://www.urbandetroitonline.com/detroit-real-estate/episode-29-detroit-investor-tv-section-8-no-more/
Detroit has truly been a gut wrenching experience for me.

sorry typo, should be "buy the house" not "but the house"

Hi Kevin,
I want to thank you for giving me the referral to Jan at Suite Properties. She has been my savior in this all of this mess. She is the one who has gotten the tenants out, and is my new property management company. The house is in Castle Rouge, Hazelton Street, she said it is a desirable neighborhood. Well, the guy who found the investor to but the house said the house had to have section 8 tenants in place. I heard horror stories about section 8 in one of Jeremy Burgess's video. Do I expect worse to come?

Yes, I feel very taken advantage of. This sale was from a friend of my son's. My son recommended this "deal" to me. I have lost many nights of sleep over the whole time I had this property. One thing after another. It is endless. I have emailed the guy who sold it to me many times. He is the one who found an investor to buy it for $30,000. It is awful for me to loose that much money, but I was stupid to follow advice from 30 year old successful entrepreneurs that think nothing of loosing $10,000.

I bought a home in Detroit Dec 2009. It was a package including rehab for $35,000, in a good neighborhood. To make a long story short, I had unexpected bills and bad tenants. I had to change management companies to get them out. The tenants destroyed the house, just under $5,000 of repairs. They never paid the water bill, (the previous pm did not have them sign a water afidavit),and the house just got broken into and vandalized (rehab was almost done), my guess by the previous tenants. I now have to pay to have the house boarded up. Last year I profited $2,000, but that was only because the previous pm wanted this to work. He didn't charge for his fees to place the tenants and also some of his agent fees since the tenants did not pay full rent most of the time. Also he didn't charge for some minor repairs he did. For this year, I am about $5,000 in the negative. As the months go on with out a tenant it will be more. The new agent is very efficient and I won't have the problem with the electric bill and water bill again. But Detroit is fees, fees, fees. My question is, is Detroit worth it? It may take me a couple years just to recoup the money I am out this year. Are there any happy Detroit investors? This feels like a mony pit to me. I have someone who will buy it for $30,000 with tenants in place. Should I get out now before I loose more $ ?

So should I pay for the tax reevaluation or will there be no decrease?

Thank you all for your input. I will back out of this one. The rents went down right when we bought a unit in July. That is a direct reflection of the decrease in the amount allowed for the section 8 vouchers. I know there are better investments, I don't know what I was thinking. The ocean view and price got me, but I understand now that there are more factors that make a good investment. Thank you so much!

So does that mean that if I have my taxes reevaluated this month, my Wayne County home taxes will never go down to $1,000? What can I expect the taxes to go down to after they are reevaluated? They are currently $3,300. When I bought the house, the taxes were listed at $2,400. I recieved a statement in the mail for notice of assessment stating a reduction of $369.53. Will my taxes be reduced any further? I am paying the mangement company $90 to do the tax reevaluation for me.