All Forum Posts by: Kim Rose

My husband rents a room in a ski condo each season which gives him weekend access the entire season. We are considering doing something similar ourselves with buying a second home in the mountains and renting our rooms during ski season and the entire home as a an airbnb during the off-season. Does anyone have advice on where to start? Anyone currently doing something similar? 

@Justin Windham YES! We finally bought our first home this spring and are very much done with this landlady. It was over a year ago now. If she came after us, we would have pursued it.. but we didn't really need the money (it was just the principal of it all) so we just decided we rather have peace of mind and let it go. Even if we won, doesn't mean she would pay up. Lawyer said he had many win cases in the millions where there was no payout. So it was a learning experience... no more private landlords if we were ever to rent again. As tenants we learned the risks that come with dealing with landlords.

@Bill S. I actually asked my realtor about this 20% below market advice and he responded that it doesn't happen and that this is a seller's market. There are a few properties on the MLS that have been there long-term and have had multiple contracts fall through due to either structural or water damage. Are these the properties we want?! And if we are purchasing a home at near market value... do we want a single family or multi?

@Justin Windham The lawyer did mention compensation for unlawful withholding of our security deposit--but he also said that with legal fees we'd probably break even. He also said that if we won the case, there is no guarantee that she would even pay the funds owed. In the end, it seemed like a lose-lose... we left the ball in her court to see if she was going to pursue the cost for "damages" and put us into collections.. but the lawyer suspected she was bluffing just to keep our entire deposit, which she was. We moved into a much nicer apartment building and let it go.. She was a real nightmare landlord. We had so many very serious issues happen with her. Now we feel that if someone like her was able to be a landlord, why can't we?!

@Lacie Morris Thanks for your input! We have been tenants for a long time with our pets. Here in Colorado, there are lots of pet friendly rentals. Our problem with renting a house though in the more desirable neighborhoods was that there were so many qualified applicants  that the landlord always preferred the ones without pets or the ones who had 1 dog and not 2. We have had to pay exorbitant non-refundable pet deposits and monthly fees.. and it seems to be a welcome money maker for lots of landlords. And especially the greedy ones. We had a horrible tenant experience with one landlord who charged us a large non-refundable pet deposit and then when we moved out claimed that our dogs had caused several thousand dollars worth of damage beyond our pet/security deposits... which was entirely false. We had to see a lawyer about this and in the end learned that this was her tactic for bullying tenants into keeping their entire security deposits. We decided it wasn't worth taking her to court over. As tenants, we then decided no more private landlords ever again.

@Bill S. That is some great advice! Thank you. How does one find these undervalued homes? We are not paying in cash. I feel like experienced investors in the area would just snatch up the good deals quickly. And the homes that are on the MLS that are excessively cheap have been on the market for a long time and just seem suspicious. It seems like these amazing 25-30% below market value deals are just elusive for average people.

@William Allen, I guess we're looking at it too simplistically and not digging deep enough.. but the way I see it is that in 30 years with just a $30k downpayment we will have a fully paid off house.

Unless the housing market crashes, how can any real estate investment in the long term not be worth it? Even if there's no appreciation.. if the house just maintains its value and even if we put in $100k into.. we still come out with a profit. I know I'm missing something here and I must be very naïve.. but it just seems like too much of a win situation.

We already have our entire retirement riding on the stock market. Real estate seems like something a little more comfortable.. at least if one day we go completely under we have a fully paid off house to live in!

We are looking to purchase our first rental property, but are feeling overwhelmed about the amount of information and "analyses" people use to make their decisions. We have a few personal friends who own rentals and none of them ever really went into depth with these things and all are doing well so far...

We live in Colorado Springs where home prices and population have been increasing. There is still a growing market here, and the colleges and military bases all bring in plenty of renters. My husband and I rented here for several years here before buying our house and our rental applications were turned down often because we were competing with so many other applicants (we have pets!)

If we're buying a single family home that is not undervalued or a foreclosure in a growing area where home prices are expected to rise, shouldn't we reasonably assume that its value will go up.. as we expect to happen with our own home? (we don't live in California!)

Also, for a place that is going to be used 100% for renting, do you buy the worst house on the block that can rent cheap or a nice place that you would live in yourself, but that is considerably more expensive?