All Forum Posts by: Jon Shoop

@Dale K Poyser from the comments here and my own experience, I would say this what I would do:

Pay for a GC, plumber, or electrician to come out and inspect your situation. Have them pull the permits and re-do/fix and sign off on the room to get it permitted. It's just drywall to open up and check. A few hundred bucks now may save you thousands at closing.

Heck, even just calling a couple GCs in your area to get their opinion is well worth your time.

Depending on your city, you may get away with it, but it'll still be a pain and worry of yours if you don't do anything. Heaven forbid something catastrophic happens because you guys missed one simple electrical thing that an electrician or GC would catch.

@Thao Thi Thanh Tu

@Joe Funari can definitely take care of you. I've already recommended some of my clients to him. He's awesome.

I'm with @Mike Cumbie on this one. Nothing good can come of having your neighbors agent inspect or come onto your property.

I would suggest having your own agent or a city inspector to come and provide a report to you and your neighbor. Also with having a city inspector come to you too, you might be able to have them add the part of how there would be an extremely difficult and expensive time to remove that tree that it virtually makes it impossible.

@John Morgan I have a client who has had a tenant for 20 years and another for 15. Impressive! But the 20 year tenant just moved put and we had go do avout a complete refurb on the interior of the house. The tenant had dogs running the place...

@Jonathan R McLaughlin probably the best advice on here.

@Mike Morawski thank you I appreciate the kind words. I'm really enjoying all the information im able to glean from all of the experts on these forums.

@Tyrone Marson

I think you are getting some solid advice and good questions to answer for yourself. I think you were on the right track with seeking the help of a quality property management firm. There's a lot of liabilities and costs to consider when running any type of business - and don't kid yourself, that's what you're doing here!

There are also a lot of lessons to be learned and taught in managing tenants and properties. I'm glad I'm with the company I am to teach me the ins and outs. A main thing I'd convey is learn how to properly vet your tenants.

Best of luck with your property and future!

@Michael Fortier on first glance, learning from your own mistakes is a great idea. And I know a lot of us A-types are avid DIYers. However, have you thought of having a property management company help you with your first year or home rentals by watching them do the listing process as well as seeing how they conduct themselves and how they manage their properties? For ~8% that's a pretty cheap way to climb that learning curve for a year.

Honestly before I got into property management I had no idea of all the ins and outs of rentals. Or all the sites available to list an available rental. For me, I'd like having a professional company set the example of how I should conduct myself as a landlord before making some serious and/or costly mistakes. Just my two cents.

@Christian Lawson

I think you should do the 30 yr fixed and hold it for a year at least, to do a 1031. Why pay so much in taxes when you can rent it out and roll it into more property later on?

Congratulations! 

I would definitely start with the Fair Housing Act rules in Oklahoma. Then I'd read all 35 documents that @Jean Soo just linked. Property management isn't as easy as I thought it would be when I started out. And watch lots of youtube videos on PM