All Forum Posts by: Mar Now

Yes it's paid off. It's funny that about  4 years ago it was appraised at $200k and $1600 rent was a good deal. But now that it's gone up to $350k at $1800 rent it's all of a sudden considered as losing money?? (Thomas S. ) When I didn't add a cent to it and rents went up. 

Cameron Davis,  your $600 tenants are single people, may not stay too long, more vacancies, etc? My tenants were usually families w a baby, kept the place spotless.  most stayed 2+ years. I need a ggood way to factor those types of things into the equation.

Thanks for your thoughts on this.  Like you point out, it is easy to oversimplify the situation. 

I believe appreciation to 850k in 25 years may even be an underestimation since people are still flocking to the Pacific NW for high tech jobs.  Also I've consistently averaged ~ 80% of the rent because, being new, it has few repairs (yet) and we turn over tenants in about 3 days (we always have 30 days notice or an early termination fee).  Plus I expects rents to increase due to the quick rise of housing prices in the past ~2 years.  So yes it looks like an easy decision to sell, but these three factors are in favor of keeping it.  It's not so easy to just look at only market estimate and rent.  

I like your option 2).  I actually hadn't really thought of that.  The one issue with those numbers is it's almost impossible to find anything in Chicagoland for $150k except where you don't want to live or deal with section 8 tenants.  I could buy foreclosures but you have to remodel before you can even rent, then they'll just get trashed.  I don't know where people find decent places for $150-200k.

I don't owe anything on it.  I know the rent is a lower percentage of the value of the house, but it's pretty good for what I paid for it.  Prices there are skyrocketing.  Plus, it's in a nicer area and I've never had to evict anyone, never had to pay for damages, never had anyone skip out on the lease, and it's been continuously rented all 15 years.  It's all young educated people moving to get high paying high tech jobs in the area.

I've considered what you are saying, but where are people getting 2% rents?  In all three large urban areas I've lived in, the rents are never even 1%.  Maybe out in the rural areas?  Also, I'm not seeming to find $200k properties that are not dumps or in bad neighborhoods.  Maybe I can get better rent ratios but if I have to deal with vacancies, damage, and iffy tenants, etc,  is it worth it.

I have a rental house in the west coast that I've had for almost 15 years, purchased for $150K and now estimated at about $350k.  Rent is about $1800/mo and the place has been continuously rented all that time, with me managing it myself until we moved to the midwest a few years back.  Taxes are about $3k and I pay about $1k a year for management fees.   

I've started buying property locally and wonder if it's time to let go of the property and reinvest it here.  I hate to let it go because it's in a high demand area with top rated schools and lots of large house new construction nearby helped drive up the prices, but I don't think the income is that great for what the property is worth now.  The only other benefit is I can possibly write off a trip there because I can say it's business, but I don't even have a good reason to fly there anymore.  

Wondering if I should keep it or not.

I am renovating an old split level in a Chicago suburb which has a large addition on the main level. Because of the  extra space I have an opportunity to turn the basement into a 4th BR for only a couple thousand more. There is already a full bath on the basement level. 

Any downside to this? It's a last minute decision so I want to try to think through it quickly.