All Forum Posts by: Judah Johnson

Hello BP world!

Quick backstory. Found a house that suites my needs as another rental.  It is vacant but has squatters continuously breaking in.  I met the owners yesterday and was able to express interest in the property though a price was not discussed at this initial meeting.  They're both in their 90's, live 40 minutes away from the house and need help with this property. I'm also a contractor so I dropped a business card and said I'd be happy to help maintain if needed. They seemed grateful. 

This couple has every reason to sell. The husband is willing but the wife is reluctant for reasons that seem to be sentimental. 

I'm new to pursuing properties this way and would like some advice on how to follow up. Got a great face to face in. Couple seems close and does need help. Should I offer to secure the house for free? and just get into their good graces and get a relationship going? Stop by again next week/month? Send a follow up letter/call? Any advice is appreciated.

No. You will need actual subfloor (3/4 osb or ply) below the cement board to support it. And you'll only need cement board if you're laying tile. Cement board alone will be far to soft, among other problems. Good luck!

Hello all! I just finished negotiating the sale of one of our single family rentals and got me wondering if anyone has anything unusual they like to throw out in a counter offer to "sweeten" the deal without just lowering the price or adjusting closing costs. For example I offered to have the house professionally cleaned before closing. Maybe you've offered to pay for their moving truck or enroll the them in the jelly of the month club??? Anything out of the ordinary?

I had this same problem a few years back on a rental. Tree roots invading the pipe. Roto Rooter said very quickly that they would have to tear up my drive and replace it. Starting at $3k. Long story short that was a bit suspect to me so I got a second opinion that said to use the copper sulfate (or whatever it is) you pour down the drain. They said the trick is to do it right after the roots have been cleared and at a time when the line isn't getting use for a couple days. I'd did and we haven't had a problem since. Going on about 4 yrs now. If it were me, I'd at least give it a shot, might buy you some time.

I personally like picky tenants. Keeps me on top of things and most of the stuff is simple to fix or a non problem. I see the downside and understand how non emergency calls get old but in my experience the tenants usually think highly of you when you address any issue and the frequency of calls typically dwindles the longer they stay. Now if the rents not coming in on time or they're tearing the place up that's a different story.

Thanks @Spencer Brennon will definitely consider it. Though I'm not a numbers guy now I plan on learning more with each project and would like to begin with a program that I can grow with. Excel may be the one. If I may, what do you mean "run parallels" on a Mac? 

Thanks for the replies everyone. We've done many flips and buy & hold deals on napkins and just started using spreadsheets to helps us keep track of things. We should have been doing this all along but like @David Chwaszczewski said, the important thing is finding and executing deals. Which we continue to do. I'll stick with Numbers for is until I have a real reason it to. Thanks again!

What are you using? What is the standard? I'm using Apple's Numbers app because it came with my mac but I'm starting to see that Excel seems to be the standard. Should I switch over? I'm just making simple project budgets for my flips but will use more and more as I move forward and start looking more toward showing others (investors) what I'm doing. Cash flows ROI etc... Any help is welcome. Thanks in advance!

p.s. I'm a contractor who's learning to be a numbers guy so this is not my forte.

A fair amount of our tenants are students. I find that for the most part they don't care. As long as it's not Almond. That been said SS could give you an edge on getting a higher quality tenant. A grad student or something similar. I don't see the worry in keeping it clean, how often do you have to clean your tenants appliances?

All great responses! I've already said I'm definitely a gut guy but I'm forcing myself to become more familiar with the numbers side of things. I'd say I use the numbers to keep my gut in check. I've had great feeling about many properties but the numbers just aren't there and that's when you call it off. My gut gives me an edge, my numbers keep me from going over it.