All Forum Posts by: Igor Messano

Just settled on a property a few weeks ago and tenant moved in 2 days ago. Just yesterday I was telling my partner we need to call the city to have them trim tree branches that were hanging over our property risking tree damage and yard hazard.

Well this morning a very large branch fell over the property and crushed the fence, damaged siding, ripped out power lines, etc. I’ve read here that is cases of homeowner vs homeowner no one is liable which seems crazy to me. Is this also the case for a city owned vacant lot? The tree is grossly overgrown over the property line and I would think the city has a responsibility to maintain their property. Why would a tree not be considered their liability if they own it and the property it’s on?

Any idea if I will be able to get the city to move on this (when things are back running).

@Andrew B. That was might thought. I am not defending the idea as I posted to get this kind of feedback but my thought was that I would be buying out the lease but instead of leasing to a new tenant at market rent, I would essentially allow the same tenant to sign a new lease with increased rent. It could be a win-win as I would increase the rent going forward like many landlords do when buying out an existing tenant, and the tenant would make cash from the old lease and sign a new lease to a property and they might like to continue doing business on. The only difference here is who the "new" tenant is.

@Breelon Bryant

Absolutely run your own numbers. If you are relying on the previous owner to give you your numbers you are going to get burnt. 500 per month on insurance is incredibly high. You also mentioned mortgage insurance? How is the landlord the one giving you this figure? The lender that you are using should be the one estimating this for you. Call an insurance agent and get a quote for the insurance.

Hi everyone,

Thought came to mind and was wondering if this is ever done, and if so what is the good and the bad. Let's say I have a commercial property with a couple of small retail locations (300 sqft) where rents are significantly below market. Is paying a tenant for the right to increase rent a thing? I know you can pay to buyout the lease. But if a tenant is a good tenant has anyone ever though about buying the lease but essentially signing a new lease with the same tenant for market rent?

The thought is I could keep the same good tenant instead of gambling on an unknown tenant, the tenant gets continuity to their business instead of finding a new place for likely similar rent, and I get to increase my NOI for sale or refinance purposes.

No details of what the property is, where it is, condition, what NOI is, if the property is fully occupied with market rents or there is room for improvement, how reno does it need, etc. You essentially gave everyone 3 numbers and want to know what it's worth?

The RM-1 zoning helps you here a bit but here is the short version of the issues you have that you might be able to solve. Phila law says you may not have more then 4 unrelated persons living in the same property. This is to prevent rooming houses which is basically what you are trying to do. Where the zoning helps you is that the 4 person rule is by unit and not property. So if you have a property that can be easily zoned for multi family you could turn it into a multifamily and rent out individual rooms. This means you would need to breakout your property to include 3 kitchens so each unit has it's kitchen and bath and entrance.

A lot of people have illegal rooming houses and make a killing doing it. The issue is that if you ever have a problem with the tenant you can't just go to the city to evict them since you are in the wrong. 

I am purchasing right now a property with 7 bedrooms that is legally zoned as a 2 family. What we are doing is splitting it back out to a duplex and then renting it out as short term rentals by the room. This way we are not within the 4 persons per unit rule. Whatever you do, make sure you have an exit strategy if something goes bad.

I am not from the area so I cannot give you specific advise but here is the usual problems for newbies and some questions to ask yourself:

1. 1) Where are you getting your leads from? Most newbies are strictly going on the MLS. This means you are competing with everyone and in a hot market this means you are likely not going to make a profit on these unless you scoop something up day 1-2 and get lucky. Off market deals is what you want if you are to buy something at a good discount.

1. 2) How are you estimating rehab costs? Maybe due to your inexperience you are over estimating (not a bad thing to be conservative) and more experienced investors are beating you because they know their numbers better and know what they can squeeze out of a property. Again, if you had off market deals you wouldn't be competing with others willing to take a tighter margin.

• 3) Is your market not ideal for flipping at the moment? Don't try to make a flip fit where it might not fit at the time. Not all markets support decent rental numbers. Not all markets are good for flips all the time due to lack of supply. With enough work you can find a deal in any market but it's a matter of how long will it take with how much effort and whether you are comfortable with the price point. However, if you are looking to start doing one deal after another, going to a less crowded market might be better.

I’ve scoured the forums and posts reading everyones suggestions for master key options and I never heard of anyone suggesting this although it’s widely available. The suggestions are generally on of 3:

- Use locks by landlordkeys

- Use electronic password locks

- kwikset smartkeys for turning over units

I found this video on YouTube for a Kwikset product that not only has the smartkey feature for turning over units, but allows you to have a master key!! Best of both words.

It’s the “Kwikset key control deadbolt”. It’s the same concept of the smartkey where you can rekey the lock in seconds but this one has two independent key slots, both of which can be smartkeyd in seconds for different keys. This way you can change the keys for a new tenant, but also reset all of your locks to a different key to be used as a master lock.

This is the product: https://www.homedepot.com/p/Kwikset-816-Series-Satin-Nickel-Single-Cylinder-Key-Control-Deadbolt-featuring-SmartKey-Security-816-15-SMT-RCAL-RCS/202641720

NNN is a lease type which depending on the area and asset it can be 10MM++ or 500k. Not necessarily.

Article does not make much sense to me.

1) Builders focused on expensive housing causing a shortage of affordable housing (ok)
2) Millennials leaving college increases demand (ok)
3) Baby boomers don't have an incentive to sell due to low prices (what?)

Unless they are again talking about boomers selling high value housing, this makes no sense. If demand goes up for affordable housing, the prices for housing should go up outside of the expensive end of the market.