All Forum Posts by: Jacob Edmond

This is actually kinda scary. The full text of the ordinance is linked in the article.

Does anybody else have any incite on this? Seems kinda fishy, but overall if you ate vetting your tenants well, it shouldn't be too bad. I don't own any rental properties here yet.

http://coladaily.com/2015/12/06/landlords-homeowne...

Is all of your debt yours or is some of it your spouse's? 

There are two angles ultimately, increase your income, or decrease your debt, however that is the simplified version. Increasing your income is obvious, but usually the harder option. 

The easier option is usually to decrease your debt, because this can be attacked by paying off debt, eliminating it by not including your spouse in the loan if they have more debt than their contributing income can counter. 

Lastly, and probably the best option is to apply for a smaller mortgage, or buy a cheaper house.

We recently bought our second house while renting out our first primary residence. We didn't have 2 years on rental income yet so we had to qualify for both counting against our DTI. My wife has no income currently being a SAHM but she has half of our student loan debt, so I applied for the mortgage by myself.

Well I thought I would update since we have made some progress on the remodel. 

I got most of the cabinets in yesterday. I was able to build these all at work, which saved me a ton of money. I still have to close in the soffits and run the valances below theuppers, put on toekicks, etc. 

I still have to install the cabinets on the sink wall. There will not be any uppers on this wall. I am going to build some open floating shelves.

We went with a floating bamboo wood floor in the living and kitchen. I still have to run all new trim and trim everywhere.

Everything you see in these two rooms is new drywall that I did myself, which is mostly what took so long.

This is what the cased openings look like from the other side.

I still have to get a plumber in to prep for the sink, dishwasher, disposal and run a new water line to the new fridge location.

I also have to get the electricians back in the finish up the Leds under the uppers and trim out the can lights and put in outlets, etc.

Then comes the stone countertops. I'm looking st another solid month I think before all is said and done.

I don't see anything from wrong with separate accounts for each house. I only have 1 rental property right now, but I have a checking account that is only used for that house. My tenant deposits her rent at the bank into that account, which is very convenient for me. It makes it very easy to track income and expenses for that house separate from everything as well.

I bought my house in May. And made it almost through summer with no issues, but in August our outdoor air handler blower motor would periodically cutoff and not come back on. We have to shutoff the unit and turn it back in and it would fine again, for awhile. 

We had just gotten our electric panel and service upgraded the day before we started having issues. So I initially assumed they missed something when hooking up the new panel. I called the electrician back out and he said everything appears to be working fine now. I don't see anything wrong. His dad was an HVAC handyman so he sent hi. Out the next day. He topped off the coolant, but also said everything seems to be fine now.

We still had issues after that, so the next day I got an HVAC company to come out. It was working fine them too, but the blower capacitor was reading weak, so he replaced that and said to wait and see if that does it. It worked great for about 24 hours, longer than before. And then we noticed it was getting hot again, and check the vents, and it had stopped blowing again. Still the compressor was running though, just the blower stopped.

We called back and they came out and replaced the control board for the blower. Again, we didn't notice any issues for a couple of days then, but again the blower cut off. At this point I was getting tired of racking up a tab to this company and I decided to get a new thermostat to see if that might make a difference. I had been wanting to get a Nest anyway.

I bought a nest, installed it and it seems like it was working grest, but after a couple of says the blower stopped again. It came right back on after restarting though, and at this point we are questioning our own sanity and whether we are imagining this or not. So we waited a few days until last weekend when it shutoff like 3 times. So Monday I called the same HVAC company back and told them nothing has been fixed yet and I need them to send someone out to look at it again. He came out yesterday, and of course the unit was working perfectly the whole time. He checked everything it seemed, and I told him again about upgrading out main panel, so he checked to make sure the breakers were compatible (?) And said we could replace the relwy switch and see if that does it. Theydidn't call me today to say they had sent someone to do so, so I don't think they replaced it yet, but when I came home tonight the blower was off again. I have been home for an hour and have restarted 4 times and ea check time it has cut off within 10 minutes.

I'm at a loss at this point and I don't want to give this company any more money, and I don't feel like they are capable of fixing it at this point. 

Any suggestions or ideas? This seems insane to me. And I know almost nothing about hvac.

My unit has a gas pack for heat and electric ac.

I own in Summerville, which Im not sure it technically fits into this, but it's close. Values have been rising slightly in that neighborhokd, but I don't think it really fits this trend too much. The neighborhood my rental house is in is an older established neighborhood with no new construction. I haven't followed prices in Charleston really though so I don't know. I think it's probably pretty accurate though. Jay Heinrich would be a good one to ask.

I'm not sure how much equity is needed for a cash out refi, that's part of what I'm looking to find out. Just based on my estimations, I think I will end up owing just over $100k and the house will be worth  in the $160s once my reno is done. 

Currently I have enough to do a 3-5% for the price range of houses I would be looking at, not enough for conventional.

 That is what I am trying to decide. I have one rental house currently, and want to buy more buy and hold properties over time. I am currently trying to decide if I would be better served to sell after the minimum 2 years and take the profit tax free, or stay and use my equity to fund another property.

if I currently have an FHA mortgage with PMI, am I better served to look into a HELOC or try to refinance? I just bought with about $14000 in equity, and I am renovating to gain another $30-40k.