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All Forum Posts by: Karissa Sampson

Karissa Sampson has started 9 posts and replied 63 times.

Stick with the deal. Looks like it makes sense on paper. Im in a high priced area. Housing prices dropped like 30k for single family homes but havent really change for multifamily and thats my niche. I'm in a similar spot under contract but rate locked almost a month ago at 5.85%. Even if I blew up the deal and found something 30k cheaper the mortgage ends up the same with the new interest rates today at the bank being 6.5%. And I've lost out my earnest money, lost rent that I couldve started collecting by restarting the closing process, spending more money for inspections/appraisals, more stress and more of my time (high value to me), and lost value of my money given inflation.

No. Landlord response seems appropriate. A 4 day turnaround time to repair the freezer is very reasonable. You could use the $250 savings on rent to buy a small stand alone freezer for future storage and that would free up your normal freezer space for adult food. That being said, I empathize with the loss of so much breast milk and wish you the best.

Properties with an HOA. Theoretically an HOA seems like a good idea, but realistically most are corrupt and dysfunctional organizations that charge too much and as an owner I have no control over the fees.

My only hard passes would be too many major repairs all together, flood zone, and bad neighborhood. With enough money, you can fix a house's problems but you can't change the neighborhood the house is located in or move the train tracks.

I used to say foundation and roofs issues but now, it really depends on what those issues are.

Current property under contract has "foundation issues" but when I had a structural engineer come out, the problems were far less serious than the inspector thought.

Now, I have seen/heard nightmare stories about foundations issues too. Adding up $20k foundation + $20k roof + $10k sewer + $? asbestos mitigation + the entire remodel is a bit much. BUT-in the right market, the right house, and if the numbers work it might still make sense for some cases. Know your market, know your business and its finances, and trust the numbers.

Post: Everybody has a Pitbull 🤷‍♂️

Karissa SampsonPosted
  • Colorado
  • Posts 63
  • Votes 40

I personally have nothing against dog breeds labeled "aggressive". I really like pitbulls and have had nearly all positive experiences with them personally. We allow pets in our rentals but we meet all the pets first, have a non refundable pet fee and monthly pet rent, and require tenants to carry a renter's policy that covers their pet. The renters policies that cover pets vary widely in what they do and do not cover and although its helpful, they can be very vague at best about dog bites/attacks. Our insurance policy is absolutely not accepting of these breeds though. I have too much at stake to take on that risk and paying for that type of coverage is cost prohibitive and an amount that would not fly with tenants if I passed it down to them. 

Regarding ESA (emotional support animals), I find it frustrating that the FHA and ADA differ on whether ESAs must be accepted or not by landlords. I think the FHA is too liberal in requiring landlords to accept ESAs under almost all circumstances. In my line of work, I get requests for ESA letters. My anecdotal experience is that 90%+ of the time, the person's condition does not qualify as a disability which, having a disability that the animal helps with is a requirement of ESA. We all feel better and less stressed/anxious/depressed etc. when we are with our pets, but this does not mean we have a disability. I am in full support of people with disabilities and against discrimination of them. My sister has autism. I have seen her have to stand back and not get the services she deserves because others are taking advantage of a system that is not protecting my sister, in part because the requirements are not stringent enough.

We continue to accept pets and ESA animals in our rentals and thus far have had only positive experiences.

Nevermind. Just lost the deal and my earnest money. Still would appreciate the answer to my question if anyone sees this. Also, I still have not found a reliable lender after going through 6 in the past 6 months to try to close a deal. Lost two houses under contract at the last minute because underwriting changed their mind about approving the loan. The first one I got the earnest money back and now, I just lost all $4k of it.

Thank you all for your thoughtful advice. We dont really have humidity issues in colorado even in the basements and this one is certainly bone dry. I was leaning toward the mini splits to avoid ductwork especially in the downstairs unit and because I was planning to mini split the garage conversion anyways. I'll have HVAC come out and evaluate the property. Good quotes are great. Also-structural engineers are worth their charges in gold.

Underwriting is being difficult. I close in 3 days and they want an IRS Transcript for a partnership return. I cannot find this on the IRS website. Since a partnership is a pass thru entity, is the K1 showing profit/loss etc. on my individual transcript the only transcript item I will see for the partnership or will the partnership itself end up with its own IRS transcript? I cannot figure out how to search for transcript by the partnership's EIN or to locate the partnership transcript.  I did find my Tax Return Transcript, Tax Account Transcript, Record of Account Transcript, and Wage and Income Transcript. I am curious how to find a partnership IRS transcript? Does anyone in BP world know how to do this asap? Earnest money in jeopardy (lender blew my loan deadline, reassuring me the whole time I was good to close), closing in 3 days, need to figure this out quickly. Thank you to anyone who might be able to help.

Quote from @JD Martin:

Long term, you are better off biting the bullet, install your ductwork and your central heat & air.

In my area, there's no way a B+ neighborhood property doesn't have central heat & air. You're not going to hardly rent C class housing around here without it, forget about anything better. 10k on HVAC is probably a drop in the bucket if you think about the property as a long-term return generator, if it's a long-term rental for you, or even if it is a flip. 

Over the years one of the big things I learned about rental rehabs: don't be cheap. I'm not saying spend dumb money or add dumb stuff when not warranted, but not taking care of the basics during a rehab is a bad strategy. Here's one of my own examples: I had a house that was in great shape but had a late 50's bathroom, complete with late 50's false tile (plastic) all over the bathroom, including the shower. All of it in great shape, no damaged tile or anything. Debated whether we should just go ahead and rehab the bathroom while it was empty, but decided to just do the vanity and mirror since the bathroom was in such good shape. Fast forward to lousy tenant, who apparently didn't understand the concept of cracking a window to let the humidity out (no bath fan, remember 1950's). Right when they were getting ready to leave - we let them out a month early because they were broke - they complained about tiles falling off the walls. Well, what happened was the massive humidity loosened probably 50% of the tiles, exposing the cement board/plaster product below and letting a bunch of tiles fall off the wall, where huge chunks of adhesive were stuck in the plaster. No good way to fix. Ended up down almost 2 months while the bathroom was torn out and redone. If we had just redone the bathroom during the rehab, when it was already empty, we would have lost no time - it could have been done while other jobs were going. So the 2 months down cost us $3k in lost rent, and we still spent the money on fixing the bathroom.


 I agree that doing the work to install HVAC and ductwork now while the basement is unfinished is ideal. I am completing an up/down duplex conversion and want to minimize overhead ductwork and "basement feel" in the downstairs unit. I also would like to have the tenants responsible for all utilities, so I would need to install two seperate HVAC units (2 furnaces, condensers for AC etc.) In Colorado, its only really hot enough to want AC for 3 months of the year. I'm trying to think if there are some alternatives to going full-bore for both units and having different HVAC setups for each unit. Any other thoughts out there?

House is in a B+ neighborhood. Has a hot water baseboard heat (gas) and no ductwork. No central AC. Located in Colorado. July/August can be quite hot. 1/3 of the rental listings in town have central AC, the rest do not. Not looking to drop $10k+ on HVAC.

-Do I leave the baseboard hot water system in place (reliable, efficient) and dont add central AC?

-Do I add central AC? And if I'm adding ductwork for AC, then should I just switch to forced air heating? What do you do with all that copper pipe?! Concerns about ductwork taking up ceiling space in the finished basement....

-Minisplits, thoughts? Is there such a thing as a minisplit that does AC only?

Trying to figure out if I need to pony up the money to add AC or not while the basement is unfinished and renovations will be going on.