All Forum Posts by: Jon Kepler

@Steven B., one important consideration is that you cannot legally receive a fee for representing a landlord at the LTB. In order to do that, you need a LSUC number, which means you need to be a paralegal or a lawyer. Even if they hire you for general management services, they will need to hire a paralegal or represent themselves at the LTB. Ontario law can be frustrating.

In terms of general fees, I agree with everyone else here: 10% of gross rents + a 1 month lease-up fee. We sometimes do a lease-up for less than that when we know it will be an easy unit to fill.

I've always wanted to watch an interesting show about a large, successful landlord. All of the house flipping shows are getting monotonous. I finally found one! Here is the link to a preview:

https://youtu.be/yxprQpcrB6U

If you want to see the whole show, just click their YouTube channel and start at episode #1.

What do you think? Is Ben Mallah better to watch than the Montelongo family and the rest of them?

Have you considered approaching a landscape architect in your area?

@Igor Tomic, I hear your frustration. I file regularly, so I know where you are coming from. However, you have to appreciate the public's perspective: we are the sophisticated millionaires, and they are not.

To a certain degree, the board does protect us. I had a tenant come after me for $16,000 once; the board threw it out.

As a rule, I disagree with petitions. I don't want to see landlords hurt at the board level any more than you do. However, the best way to prevent that is to spend time on the board's website, read through previous cases, and give yourself your own legal crash-course on how to protect your interests.

@Gjorgi Kukuvikov, that's a huge property. It will be a lot to take on without significant experience. Also, do you have the $100k to put down?

You'll need to be extremely detail oriented as you dig through all the information. It sounds like this property has a story - you'll want to find out exactly how and why the building and its owner ended up in their current situation.

@Dakoda Spencer, the first step is to go and look for apartment buildings for sale. Just find a listing online and call the agent. Tour it in person, then ask to see the financials. Do this literally 20 times. Read everything they give you, and you'll start to get a feel for how this stuff works. Some sellers will lie to you, and after going through 20 sets of paperwork, you'll learn exactly how and why that happens.

I'm an apartment building investor. I don't know if you are interested in wholesaling or some other aspect of real estate, but in any case, my suggestion is a good one. You'll learn a lot in record time.

@Mike Jebo, I agree with you in terms of the long-term "Manhattanization" of Toronto. However, it's not quite right to say that @Matt Geerts is playing it safe and slow in St. Thomas.

I'm in Owen Sound. Over several years, I went from having no real estate and very little cash to $3 million in holdings. All the vendor take-backs and private money deals would not have been offered to me if I was in Toronto.

I double my holdings every couple of years. That's very difficult to do in the GTA.

I feel your frustration @Stephen E. We had the sheriff boot someone out this week. Never a dull moment!

I'm curious. I won't flip, but I'm always interested in finding properties under market value to buy and hold.

@Brian Hosier, the size of the house doesn't technically make a difference. However, practically speaking, larger houses usually have heavier spending on fixtures, features, landscaping and so on. In our area, I would caution you to choose your neighborhood carefully, to make sure you don't lose value by building something out of character with (or superior to) the surrounding homes. Also, some of our neighborhoods are more saleable than others. For example, Potawatomi Village is one of our most prestigious neighborhoods, but selling a home there is *really* tough.