All Forum Posts by: Jerome Kaidor

I have some apartments in central south Fresno.   In the past, it's been easy to fill our vacancies, but now things seem to be getting a little slow.  Where to advertise?  In the old days, I would advertise in the Fresno Bee, and in the local freebee advertising rag.

Nowadays, everything seems to be going online.  Apartments.com?  Zillow?  Realtor.com?    Nextdoor.com?  Where do you advertise?  What works?

 Roy just buy two from used store in hayward,

Which one?  We had a fairly bad experience with one of the Hayward stores..  Wound up having to get an appliance repair person in - even though the fridge was under warranty from them.  

I once owned a 20 unit building that was built in 1915.   That sucker ate my lunch to the tune of $3K a month for ten years.  There was just no end of problems.  Add to that a bad neighborhood.... let's just say I danced a jig when I sold it.

  The electrics were goofy - there were just all sorts of bodges.  There was only one 110V 20A circuit for each apartment.  The plumbing was beyond strange;  the DWV ( drain-waste-vent ) piping was all 1 1/2 inch.  Doesn't take much poop to clog a 1.5 inch pipe.

  I vowed then and there never to buy another prewar building.  And actually, right now I wouldn't touch a property built before the mid 70's.  Lead and asbestos can turn a simple plumbing job into a superfund-site-nightmare.

There is a possible legal issue with disabling the usual way that they pay the rent.  Or so my lawyer told me.  For example, you can't refuse to take a personal check ( which might bounce ) if you've been taking them in the past.  This might be specific to California.

Hello!

    Once in a while, tenants ask if they can pay online.   I have always shied away from it.  Because - what if I'm evicting them?  I give them a 3day, they pay me a few bucks online, and the 3day is toast.   Without an online option, I can always just decide
not to cash the check.  

  In fact, this happened recently.  A tenant owed me some months of rent, I had them served with a 3day, and they mailed
me a small check.  And it was postmarked after the 3 days...
I did not cash the small check;  rather, I sent it back to them, explaining that I couldn't take it.

For an online service to be acceptable, it would have to support refusing payments that are under an easily-set threshold.
Or refusing them entirely - in an eviction situation.

Anything like that out there?

I recently passed on just such a deal.  The numbers would have worked.  Five units.  HOWEVER - what a lot of work!  Five mortgages, five property taxes, five insurance policies... 

I do have a valid fictitious business name statement on file.  With our home address.  Luckily, my tenants are not so sophisticated to search it out.  Also, we're not hard to find - there's an onsite manager at each property.  

And anyone with half a brain knows the "Jerry" is short for "Jerome"...  Grrrr!

Hello all,

   USPS is becoming annoying with their PO Box security protocols.  I just went to pick up my July rents - there was nothing in it but a notice from the post office - it seems somebody had had the temerity to send a check with my nickname.  So they not only did not deliver THAT letter - they removed ALL my letters, including all the July rents for one of my buildings.  To add insult to injury, the customer window is closed on Saturdays.

  The form says I need to supply photo ID for each PO box recipient - well, I cannot supply a photo ID for my nickname.  This is ridiculous.

I have been receiving rents at that PO box since 2012 - and before that, to another PO Box.  Maybe it's time for a change.  Has anybody used one of those virtual PO box services?  Or maybe an on-line rent collection service?  I am reluctant to go electronic with rent collections because...

...If I am evicting somebody - serve them the three-day, file an eviction, and then they pay me ten bucks through the service and spoil the eviction....?   For that reason, I need to have control over whether checks get cashed.

   Also, if I go with electronic rents collection, what if the rent collecting service goes belly-up, and my rents disappear into the void?

WRT Oakland.... do you own a bulletproof vest?   Also, Oakland has some of the most stringent rent control in all of California.  The state as a whole now has rent control also, but it's much more lax. 

Oakland recently added "owner occupied duplexes and triplexes" to the units covered by rent control.  IMHO this might be a violation of Costa-Hawkins, but I'm not a lawyer.

This year, you are allowed a whopping 2.7% increase.  Yes, there are ways to get more, but you have to petition for it, supply documentation etc.