All Forum Posts by: Kama Ward

A carpenter was fixing my rehab's front porch. There were three extremely broken down front steps going up to the porch- cracked concrete over block. I asked how much to break these up- not even haul away. He says $534. First of all- why the $34? So I will take him seriously? No thanks.

When my husband heard he borrowed a sledgehammer and a friend and had them gone and loaded into our pickup in 15 min. So the carpenter wanted $2136/hr. That wasn't really a crazy bid- more like a I don't want to do it bid. I don't use him anymore.

Yea Al!
I assembled ikea cabinets for my last rehab. Got 41 packages for 5 cabinets. Confusion, dread, and more confusion eventually gave way to happiness and a sense of accomplishment!
It took a while to get there though.

The primary residence exemption still applies!
http://www.irs.gov/faqs/faq/0,,id=199598,00.html

250K for single 500K for married

Brian- We got lucky alright! It was a young- very honorable- guy who just plain underbid the job. We could get rid of most of the wall with slope. We kept the rest of the wall under 4', so no engineering needed. No critical issues or permits needed. We gave him a bonus at the end.

I volunteer with a local organization. They had a collapsed retaining wall on their property, as well as various drainage issues. I gathered bids for them, some were people I use, and some were various recommendations from the members.

The bids were $2,700 all the way up to $45,000 dollars! Sheesh. One person suggested putting a french drain in the middle of a gravel parking lot! Crazy.

It was bit delicate, since I was new to the organization. I had to convince the guys that they should not listen to their "friends"- they needed to listen to this "little lady".

At my recommendation, we went with the $2,700 bid and everything turned out great.

What's your crazy bid story? How did it turn out?

I was 24 when I bought my first property, a duplex. I lived in one and rented the other. My mortgage was $288 and rent was $600. Life was good.

By buying right, I made sure I could sell fast if I wanted to get out, which I did 3yrs later.

I'm with Ann, along with your other strategy, consider owner occ rehabs for capital gains (if your area is not in long term decline). This is easier when you are young (single helps too). We did that every two years for several years. Then we settled down for the kids. Love getting that check and keeping it all!

I'd like to hear from a tax person about the dependent for tax purposes. I've not heard of that.

If you put your name on the title, you will most likely will need to wait 2 yrs to owner occ. another HUD (if you were thinking of doing it yourself for another property).

It's 1 yr for HUD.
You can gift up to 13k to her, if you have a wife she can gift 13k, beyond that you need to look out for IRS gift tax.
When she makes an offer, and it's all cash-- she will need a proof of funds letter.

I doubt she will qualify, but look into the Good Neighbor Next Door program, which would give her 50% off HUD's list price! (3yrs residency required)
http://portal.hud.gov/hudportal/HUD?src=/program_offices/housing/sfh/reo/goodn/gnndabot

My reaction: Yecchhh. These guys can't make a living being straight forward, so they put this cheese puff website up. I'm not giving these suckers my info!

I don't think it's an age thing, because they had the equivalent of squeeze pages in comics... I thought they were dumb way back when. ACT NOW- RECEIVE FREE SPY GLASSES!

No- My atty finally got in touch with someone in the corporate office of the HUD atty (not the local). They said there was a title issue (pin # wrong). Our county switched all the pins about a year ago, so we knew it had a good chance of sorting out.

They said we needed to file an extension, would not be charged, so we did. Then on the day the contract originally was to expire (July 19th) HUD tried to say we had no valid reason to file an extension.
It turns out they had cleared the title issue June 26th. We showed proof we had been trying to close for weeks, so they granted the extension.

Then HUD needed at least five business days to review the HUD statement- so we have closing scheduled for July 31st. I'm ready to fight back if they try to charge me for the extra days- but I don't particularly feel that it will be an issue. At least now we have a contact in the local office that responds. That was the part really getting to me. All in a day's work I suppose.

Been lining up contractors, that must mean I'm optimistic!