All Forum Posts by: Kosh Vokter

you all have been great ideas to think about. thank you!

thank you all.

Tenant yearly lease expiring in June. Very good tenants, always pay rent on time, no hassles. they are asking if they could go month to month from July, since they are looking to buy a house and don't want to sign a term renewal contract. I would prefer to retain them as tenants, but also know summer is time of moving and so it might be harder to find new tenants, say if the current tenants were to move out in fall/winter. 

1. Can I ask for say 30? day notice and ask if they would be open to me showing property to new tenants in that 30 day window to reduce vacancy time?

2. Suggest a little higher m-t-m rent, than what it would have been if it was a term renewal.

How have you dealt with such situations in the past? 

Thank you all, this was very helpful. 

i have a 1600 sq. ft SFH rental near Huntsville, AL. No insurance claims or issues in the past year or before.

Received home owners renewal notice and the annual premium went from $2400 to $3600 (50%!!!! increase) for the same $1000 deductible. It's with Liberty mutual but through Geico. I called Geico and they said it's inflation and other factors etc etc, no clear articulation of why it went by up so much. 

Are you seeing such increases as well, are there are insurance providers that I can shop for? I called few other national insurance providers when I purchased this property before and they said they don't cover Alabama and so went with Liberty Mutual through Geico. 

Currently, a 4 bed 2.5 bath, 2 story SFH. All bedrooms are on the 2nd level and there is a big open loft area with windows on 2nd level that's not used much now. Upstairs has 2 bathrooms (1 for master bedroom + 1 shared with the other 3 bedrooms).

Thinking of converting this loft space into a functional bedroom to make it a 5 bed 2 bath house for equity. This conversation would need drywall + 1 door min (not sure if a closet is also need to qualify as bedroom). 

Are there factors that am missing to consider if this conversation would really add equity to the house? I can see some families wanting to use the open loft space as additional entertainment room, or using it as study/office space. 1 shared bathroom upstairs would be shared by 4 bedrooms (instead of 3 currently) - is that somehow less desirable and/or not add a lot of equity? 

I have a remote rental in B- neighborhood that's currently vacant. It takes 2 hours to get to the property, and so have a friend who lives like 30 minutes away from the rental assisting me with the showings for prospective tenants. 

I have had lots of challenges with prospective tenants who want to come for the viewing but would drop last minute due to some issues. I had to have my friend wait at the property at-least 4 different occasions on a different dates and time, only to be stood up and the tenants don't show up. I get all kinds of reasons like car broke down, 'caught-up' with something else last minute etc from tenants. 

I have considered scheduling an open house on a weekend, but there is no guarantee even that would work for all. Some of them say they work on weekends, or multiple shifts etc. I want to be respectful of their schedule and try and accommodate, but I can't also have my friend being stood-up every time. 

What other strategies do you employ for managing showings? 

For making rent payment, tenant prefers to use Paypal with a business transfer (and not a person to person) option and Paypal charges a fee for that. To avoid that I suggested that they can make rent payments through direct bank deposit, which they are okay with.

Tenant said they can either do a wire transfer or ACH transfer.

Are there any downsides to giving the bank account # and having them make rent payments directly? I read on the forums, it's better to create a new account and provide that account # and immediacy transferring the amount to a different account once rent comes in, so as to not leave a balance. 

I don't have cozy or any other account.

I sent 14-day pay or vacate notice through certified mail. I also have proof of the notice being delivered to the tenant. I also e-mailed the notice to the tenant via e-mail. I didn't have it deliver it myself or post it on the premise, and so don't have proof of that. 

Tenants have not responded or acknowledged to e-mail or for the USPS mail delivery of the notice. 

Is certified e-mail considered as an acceptable form of delivering the notice or could the tenants possibly claim that they never received any (e-mail or USPS mail)? 

great information Richard thanks to you and Zane.