All Forum Posts by: Jay Roney

 Lucas!!  Why did I call you Victor!?!  sorry about that...

Victor - Welcome to Lansing. From what I've seen in the market in the past 18 months+ since I moved back to town, a lot of what can be said about the Lansing area market in general depends on what your goals are. If you're looking for rentals (SFR, MFR), then the city of Lansing will probably provide better returns. It's a little hard to make good money in areas like Haslett, Okemos, Mason and Williamston because of the higher property values and higher taxes compared to the rents that you can charge. Now, if you CAN find something, the demand is VERY strong in all of those areas. If you're looking for appreciation or to make money on flips, then those areas are probably better, assuming you can find deals to buy. One area that you didn't mention is East Lansing, which is highly regulated in terms of rentals due to the student population and that rental market. There are always landlords looking to sell, but you need to do your homework to ensure that the rental licensing is in place since the City isn't easy in which to get new licenses.

Good luck...as some of the other folks said, if you'd like to get together and talk Real Estate, reach out...I'm always happy to grab a coffee or something and talk about investing. Also, there is a decent, but smaller, REIA that meets once a month here in town, so once you're in the area, you're more than welcome to attend.

@Anastasia S do you belong to your local REIA? That, or a local REI group on Facebook have been a great source of investor-friendly resources like Title Agencies, attorneys and accountants when I've needed one. Both of those situations sounds complex enough that you'd want professional help to get them done, and done right so that you don't end up with a bad deal.

@Reggie Withers I would think a good real estate/probate attorney should be able to figure out the necessary paperwork. Not sure what the laws are there, but here in Michigan a spouse is automatically entitled to ownership of a property even if her name is not on the deed.

I would offer to pay the attorney's fees to get it straightened around in exchange for a signed purchase and sale agreement that includes language regarding reimbursing you for the attorney's fees should the deal fall through.

It probably is a simple fix, but I wouldn't try and do it without the assistance of an attorney.

I'm looking for suggestions/thoughts from the seasoned investors/flippers in the group.

I'm getting ready to acquire a property that is zoned residential, but according to the township is classified as multifamily. It's a two story home, approximately 1470 SF, with a garage attached via a breezeway and has a kitchen, two bedrooms, a full bath and a "sitting area" on each floor. There's a 2nd floor door to the outside as well as a separate interior staircase from the 1st floor space, but it's not currently set up with a "proper" exterior separate entrance to the 2nd floor living space. It also has a basement and the aforementioned 2-car garage with a loft area above. The property sits in a mostly residential area on a large lot (0.8 acres) in between a church and an apartment complex in an area that's mixed with subdivisions, SFH's and duplexes. I'm likely going to want to upgrade some of the mechanicals, including the electric panel (it's fuses) and furnace, possibly the HW heater as well.

My question is, what would you do in terms of remodeling the space? Would you keep it as a duplex and separate the utilities as much as possible or would you revert it to SFH? My intention is to flip it once completed.

There is a gentleman in Los Angeles that I would consider a Probate expert, especially in LA and Orange counties.  His name is Bill Gross and he is a Realtor with EXP Realty in LA.  He's very approachable and very willing to help investors and other Realtors with questions regarding Probate and may even be able to help you with getting the process started for this home so that you would be in a position to make an offer.  The rules regarding Probate can be a little daunting, but I would think Bill would be able to help you understand the options.  Good Luck!

@Mohsen Rahmati I suggest you reach out to Bill Gross with EXP Realty. He is a realtor in LA that specializes in probate situations and I would consider him an expert on probate deals, especially in California. He would be able to provide advice or even act as your agent if necessary. There are a lot of rules associated with probate deals that it would be good that you understand so that you can structure your offer and approach properly.

At a minimum the court is going to need to have somebody else assigned as the administrator or personal representative for your grandmother's estate. Hopefully, there is an attorney that your father was working with on the estate that can help you through that process.  Also, there's a Realtor named Bill Gross with EXP Realty in LA who is an expert in the probate space. I'd suggest reaching out to him, he's a great help for realtors and investors working with probate deals.

Agreed with the comments above...here's what I've been doing to try to pick up a couple of properties near me where the owners are deceased:

1) Get the owner's information from the Public Records (sounds like you already have that since you looked at the tax records)

2) Skip trace the owner's name and attempt to reach someone through their phone numbers (I use True People Search and have had decent luck finding a number - cell numbers tend to be the best versus the landlines, but it's not guaranteed either way)

3) Check the county Probate Court records to see if a Probate case has been opened.  You can usually find out who the Personal Representative is according to the case documents if it's progressed to that point so that you can skip trace that person in order to get in contact.  The PR is the person that's handling the estate and dealing with disposing of personal/real property and would be the best place to start in order to find out what's happening with the property.

Hope this helps some in order to give you somewhere to start...

@Nathan G. He did state the new lease is month to month. Still a crappy situation to be put in that could have been avoided with a better agent and/or better advice.