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All Forum Posts by: Joni Chin

Joni Chin has started 2 posts and replied 40 times.

Post: How to loose 30k on flipping in Columbus Ohio warning to Newbie

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Gaby Liu

We never found out who broke into the house but we have some suspicions and the houses next door also got broken into during the last break in. That one was the worst because they just rolled the truck right up to the house and took off with a double vanity I had just had delivered there and caused some damage to the deck as they were moving it. But the most costly was when they tore out newly installed electrical wiring and plumbing—twice. It finally stopped when I installed a monitored security system and front door and interior/exterior cameras, and sold the system with the house.

Post: Can you have too many LLCs?

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Patrick Hancock

I have one per state for my rental property, I only have one property in each but as we acquire more I imagine we will try to keep it that way, unless we get to the point where there is too much equity in the properties within each LLC at which point I would probably form another LLC. These are all "pass through" LLC as they are all owned by the holding LLC.

I also have an LLC for flips. I have been part of a JV LLC as well, but those have a been dissolved.

I have one bank account for each LLC.

I set it up this way on the advice of my attorney/CPA.

Hope this helps. :)

Post: Electric wall heaters

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Jayson Greenblatt

I have a rental in Oregon, nearly every room (including bathroom) has a (compac?) cadet heater that is individually controlled for each room (has a thermometer). My tenants pay for all utilities so I don’t know how much it is now but back when my son was in college living there with his roommates the electric portion of the utility bill was around $250-300 mo during the fall/winter months (October to March) but more like $170-200 the rest of the year. (It was an all electric house, no gas) This was by Salem OR so the winters are not as cold as NY, but it was an old 1930’s home so not “energy efficient” either. After they moved out I finally patched up the crawl space and other areas where the insulation was ripped up so I imagine that the electric bill is less now.

Post: How to loose 30k on flipping in Columbus Ohio warning to Newbie

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Al D.

Similar thing happened to be in Indianapolis, I met with everyone-contractor who was recommended by another investor, another person who was recommended that was going to be "project Mgr" -I went there to check out a property that I made an offer on, that I decided not to go through with, left and went back home. A couple months later, I am recommended a property that was supposed to be an easy, clean quick flip, and I bought it based on the so-called "project manager" recommendation and photos. Soon after I discover listing agent had incorrect information on the property and "project manager" had significantly underestimated cost of rehab and overestimated ARV. (I did the exact opposite but thought they knew better since they were local —BIG Mistake) I went through 2 years of delays, going way over budget due to shady contractor, unexpected expense of putting in new water and sewer lines and service, several break-ins (theft) and trusting the wrong people.

But I haven’t given up and will continue to invest but it was a very expensive lesson learned

Post: Zillow now charging for Rental Listings

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Federico Gutierrez

Zillow is still free in my areas but if they charged $10 a week I would still use it. I’ve only used Craigslist and Zillow but I’ve found that I get better quality of applicants and the response is far less full of scammers and tire kickers than craigslist. I haven’t had to advertise for longer than 1 week on Zillow, and I really like the applications feature too.

@Christina Smith

I’ve use cozy for individual room leases too. It’s easy— you set each one up for each room, to one individual, so each person only sees their room/rent listed. Where I have room leases is a triplex so the addresss are like this (example)

123 pine st. APT 1 Room 1

123 pine st APT 1 Room 2

123 pine st. APT 2 Room 1

So I have it set per property and within that property I have it set up individually for each room.

Let me know if you need help I could walk you through the set

up.

Post: Domestic Violence and Eviction Advice

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Jessica Jay-Maleski

Hi Jessica I was wondering what the outcome was of your situation because my rental is in Arizona and yesterday I found out that one of my tenants was beating up his girlfriend and police were called. His girlfriend doesn’t live with him but apparently she came over and that’s when neighbors could hear him beating her and police were called. I don’t have all the details but it was quite a scene when the police were called because the girlfriend was upset with the police and being uncooperative. Not sure whether he or both of them was taken to jail. I also found out that apparently this wasn’t the first time this happened but the first time police were called. Right now due to Covid-19 I don’t know what I can do if anything, and this person has a lease until July. Rent is late but payment plan was agreed upon. I am not renewing his lease but I’m wondering myself what options I have to remove him early. Before all of this happened I had already notified the tenant that he had an option to leave early due to Covid-19, in the event he couldn’t manage the rent payment but he decided to stay through the lease except with a modified rent payment plan. Were you able to get your tenant out ?

Post: New STR Law in Honolulu

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Isi Nau

Wow, I never knew that about those buildings but there were rules in some of the other condos about vacation rentals, some were only for long term rentals. Many of our investor clients bought in Waikiki banyan, island colony, waikiki sunset, and pacific monarch- all condos with a hotel operation (Aston) operating along with numerous other vacation rental companies managing units in these buildings so I didn’t realize they weren’t resort zoned.

I just feel that this is the typical situation here where they pass these laws and ordinances and not consider the “unintended consequences” of these actions.

And they should have made an exception for waikiki, among other resort areas. This will affect our tourism too. I don’t think there are enough hotel rooms or affordable vacation accommodation options for families here. And I don’t think it will help the long term rental market much either.

Post: New STR Law in Honolulu

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Isi Nau

Waikiki Banyan is located in Waikiki, in a resort zoned area—I don’t think the new law applies to waikiki, because it is a resort area. Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I didn’t think that the new law applies to waikiki. Also going back from when it was built, waikiki banyan, waikiki sunset and a significant number of the other condos in Waikiki have openly had the condo/hotel operations from the time they were built.

I believe the law applies to the thousands of illegal vacation rentals all over the island in residential areas—just a quick look through Airbnb showed quite a few in my neighborhood just a couple of miles from waikiki, these are the rentals the new law is targeting. And those have been illegal all these years, so I was surprised to see those advertised on Airbnb—though that may now quickly change.

Post: Buy and holds in Hawaii??????

Joni ChinPosted
  • Investor
  • Honolulu, HI
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 20

@Roderick Baker Jr