All Forum Posts by: Jennifer Rogers

@Jeff Schemmel, thanks for the reference! I'll follow up with Samuel.

My partner and I have a duplex in St. Paul, Minnesota that is almost done being renovated (both units). We are thinking we'll do regular long-term rentals for both units, but I have always had short-term rentals in the back of my mind for one of the units. (We can only do at most one of them as a STR in St. Paul since it's not owner occupied). I was thinking of having a STR management company come out and look at it before we list it as a long term, to see what they might have to say. Does anyone have a recommendation for companies that manage AirBnBs or other STRs?

I've looked at Mashvisor and it's not an amazing STR location, but not terrible. But we'd obviously have to furnish it. I feel like we are in ok shape for the forthcoming St. Paul rent control laws since we are starting fresh with renovated units we can set where we like to start out, but STR would be a way to keep one of the units out of that space. We are a year in to the journey of owning rental properties; this is our second duplex.

Thanks,

Jennifer

You maybe already figured out an approach that works for you... but you could check out this Rookie Reply podcast episode that addresses this question.  https://www.biggerpockets.com/...

@Jeff Rogers is in Duluth, I'm guessing he'd be happy to connect!

@Jack Hendrickson (or Tim) I would love to have the meetup list, too. Thank you!

Thanks for your suggestions, Chris. We might hire a property manager in the future but I want to start out managing to get to know this property and learn the ropes. We don't have plans for an LLC yet but that is something that we might do in the future. Your ideas made me realize that my concern may only be a temporary issue, until we do one or both of those things. I may have to decide whether to play the property manager part with our first tenants, but m aybe it won't be an issue with future tenants if we hire one. Thanks again!

Hello, my name is Jennifer.  I am new to BP and my partner and I are in the process of buying our first duplex in St. Paul, Minnesota.  I wanted to introduce myself and start with a question.

Some of the books I have ready (maybe it was Heather & Brandon Turner's "The Book on Managing Rental Properties," or "Landlording on Autopilot") suggest that it can be helpful to hold yourself out to tenants as the "Property Manager" and avoid telling them you are the ultimate owner/landlord. That way you can let the theoretical "owner" be the bad guy and say you are just following the policies.  

The duplex is only half a mile from our house, in the same neighborhood but far enough away that the sellers or other people on that block are not "neighbors" that we know.  If we end up with neighbor/friends in common, they may easily learn from these common contacts that we are not only the property managers, but we actually own this duplex.  (We have told a few of our friends and neighbors, being excited about getting our first property).  It feels weird to purposely refer to some fictitious "owner" if there is a decent chance they may come to learn the real owners live nearby too and are in fact ourselves.

Has anyone been in a similar situation, and how did you approach it? 

Thank you!

Awesome to have the veterinarian perspective on here!  Random cat owner perspective: our cat had a vaccine reaction a few years ago, so our veterinarian said no more vaccines for her.  Hopefully however you word things leaves open a medical exemption from a vet for situations like this.