All Forum Posts by: Matt Moldenhauer

Daria, you're correct. Allure is a vinyl flooring that is not glued down though. So, I guess my question is, how could one classify it? More as a carpet since it's not glued down or more like a vinyl floor since it is a vinyl floor, but it's not attached to the property because it's a floating installation? Does that make sense?

What about something like Allure flooring? Would it be treated like carpet since it is a floating floor and not permanently attached to the structure?

@Brandon Hall Thank you. 

THE years, meaning current rental year. I probably could have worded that better. I'm budgeting about $2,400 to paint the interior, replace all of the carpet and linoleum with Allure flooring and new fixtures. That happens to be our yearly income of the property. Water heater was replaced last year. 

How do you generally go about deciding what needs done/replaced? Our current rental house is about 48 years old. It's in pretty good condition, but we're going to paint all of the walls and replace light fixtures. The carpet in the living room is different from the bedrooms(which all match). The linoleum flooring in the kitchen/dining is god awful. The bathrooms are newly tiled, so are fine. I'm debating if we should try and stick it on the market as is or replace everything but the bathrooms with the Allure Trafficmaster flooring and be done with it? Doing all of this would pretty much eat up the years worth of profit, but would be done and possibly attract a "better" tenant? Any thoughts? I don't want to be a slumlord, but I don't want to go broke fixing up a place and only rely on the improvement deductions and depreciation come tax time.

We have a rental house that is 48 years old. My wife purchased it about 5 years ago as a primary residence. We turned it into a rental about a year ago and now are looking for a new tenant. Can this be depreciated? If so, when would the 27.5 years start?

All good responses. Thanks guys. 

James, that's pretty much exactly where my head is. We're not really in this for the monthly profit at this point. With the replacement of the water heater and new flooring in the bathrooms, we lost money last year, BUT the mortgage was paid on time every month, building slight equity. We're more interested in the bigger profits and less work. Renting out two homes at first that are free and clear will put us in a very nice house in our area with not much more than we're used to paying, while at the same time continuing to invest and put that money back into the "business". 

I know this is a little off topic, but as far as repairs go, how do you generally go about deciding what needs done. Our current rental house is about 48 years old. It's in pretty good condition, but we're going to paint all of the walls and replace light fixtures. The carpet in the living room is different from the bedrooms(which all match). The linoleum flooring in the kitchen/dining is god awful. The bathrooms are newly tiled, so are fine. I'm debating if we should try and stick it on the market as is or replace everything but the bathrooms with the Allure Trafficmaster flooring and be done with it? Doing all of this would pretty much eat up the years worth of profit, but would be done and possibly attract a "better" tenant? Any thoughts? I don't want to be a slumlord, but I don't want to go broke fixing up a place and only rely on the improvement deductions and depreciation come tax time.

So my wife and I combined finances after getting married and are looking for ways to put our money to work. We each owned our houses before we got together. Right now we're able to set aside about $3,000/month. I struggle back and forth with the following options:

Payoff both vehicles in a little less than a year, which would give us an extra $850/month to invest. After that payoff our primary residence(about $90,000 owed right now) because it would not be taxed as income. After that, payoff the house she owned(about $69,000 owed). After that we would move to a nicer house and own two houses free and clear that are bringing in about $1,700/month. 

Payoff both vehicles, which would then gives us about $3,850/month. Do not payoff her house which we're currently renting and have about $200/month cash flow and purchase a new $80,000-$100,000 rental house every five or so months, etc.  

I look at it a couple of ways. Paying off the vehicles is like having an automatic $850/month coming in, minus the headaches and equity loss in a property. Owning one property that's bringing in $800/month cash flow is better than dealing with four that our bringing in $200/month. 

It seems like a lot of people are all about more more more when it comes to rental property rather than less free and clear property and higher cash flow returns? To me dealing with four properties that are generating $3,200/month seems MUCH better than 16 generating $3,200. I do realize though 16 generating $12,800 in 30 years though is better long term though. 

I'm I in the ball park here??