All Forum Posts by: Melody Dodderer

I'd tell myself to save up as much as I could so I could buy investment properties. I'd also tell myself to start researching now. Real estate is an exciting world that is so versatile. I'm glad to hear you're getting involved! I'm an investor and an agent in Spokane. If you ever have any questions or want to meet up for coffee, I'd love to help out!

I have just received a request for a tenant to move into one of my units and have his company pay the rent. The company is out of town and I am unsure of the rules there. Do I have the company owner sign the lease? Are there any rules if it crosses state lines? Anything I should be aware of before proceeding?

Thank you so much! We'll definitely try to find a better tenant!

I'm in the process of turning over one of my units and, every landlord's nightmare, it's midwinter and tenants are scarce. I have an applicant and I was hoping for some feedback on whether or not I should pursue getting this person into the unit. She emailed me with a bit of a sob story about how no one would rent to her because she has a five year old drug possession charge on her record, but she has been clean ever since. She is on government assistance full time and is expecting a baby. She says she is willing to pay six months rent in advance and can have her mother cosign if there is any financial difficulty. Six months up front and clean for five years sounds nice, but I'm worried about the drug charge and potential relapses, and also the lack of employment (I'm not familiar enough with government assistance programs to know how steady that is). Any feedback would be great!

That's a good idea! I'm running the numbers on a few properties, but I've yet to put boots on the ground on site. I'm interested to see how they look!

Hi guys! I'm analyzing duplexes in Spokane this week and I ran across an idea I hadn't considered. People are saying that with a duplex you should have the tenant pay for water/sewer/garbage and also do their own lawn/snow. Having lived in and been a tenant in Spokane for years, I've always had the landlord pay for those things. Is this a common strategy in Spokane or should I continue to include w/s/g and lawn/snow in my analysis?

I'm a small business owner and as such, I am having a somewhat difficult time getting conventional loans. I make enough income, but because the banks see being self-employed as complicated income, it is more difficult for them to loan to me. I'm considering moving away from my small business and becoming a real estate agent as a career. My question is this: I see online that real estate agents are considered self-employed, so, will it improve my situation with the banks or will I be in the same boat as I currently am? Should I just find a basic W-2 job so banks will like me? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Very interested in attending! Please add me to the list.

That was all very helpful, thank you! 

One more question; The old lease I inherited does have a month to month addendum but doesn't mention any sort of price increase. So, even if they want to be month to month (not ideal but I'm ok with it), will they have to sign into a new lease that states the new rent and allows for month to month?

I inherited tenants from my first purchase and their leases will expire in a few months. I've sent them notices of rent increase for when their leases expire and requests to sign into new leases. I'm wondering, if they don't want to sign a new long term lease and want to go month to month, do I need to sign them into a new month to month lease that states the raised rent? How does that work?