All Forum Posts by: Account Closed

The landlords is responsible for anything that has to do with his or her rentals, UNLESS (as other above have said) the tenant caused the problem, for example, if they over filled the washer and it overflowed.  Forgot to turn off the water tab in the set tub.  Only then should they be held accountable.

Nancy Neville

Set them up as a class

You can start by using two types of classes:  Rehab and Wholesale.

Example

Rehabs  (Setup as a class)

     123 Maple Street (Setup as a sub class of Rehabs)

     456  Birchton Street (Setup as a sub class of Rehabs)

Wholesales (Setup as a class)

     1642 Columbus Circle  (Setup as a sub class of Wholesales)

     2254  Lincoln Drive  (Setup as a sub class  of Wholesales)

Run a Profit and Loss Report by Class and there you are

Nancy Neville

Scott that's true.  But you don't have to download newer fixes.  You can just keep what you have and keep doing what you've always been doing.  Some of my clients are still using 2003 and are very happy just the way things are.  

But very true what you say regarding your CPA and Accountants needing your upgrades so they can interact with you. 

But one can just print out their P&L from their version and still give their CPA a paper copy of it.  Their CPA can take the paper copy data and upload it into their system manually instead of using a copy of their clients data from their clients QuickBooks backup.

Nancy Neville

Rachel, as long as QuickBooks works for you and your business, you don't ever have to upgrade.  It's nice to be able to upgrade because QuickBooks is always improving their "stuff".

However, the only time you should absolutely upgrade is if you run out of data room, but you would really have to have a ton of properties and a ton of years of data stored into the program to ever run out of space. 

I say go for it.  

Nancy Neville

It is always a good idea to implement good habits right from the start.  Book work, believe it or not, will make or break you as a business.  You can be a Millionaire, but if you don't know where you stand financially, you won't be a Millionaire very long.

Now, it may seem boring to have to enter  one little item per day, if that's all you have, but you do it anyway.  If you don't do it,  and let things pile up, with the excuse you are just too busy, then you will never be able to keep up,  and pretty soon,  you are overwhelmed.    You will be unorganized and your filing system lacking,  and your data will be out of date and you are going to stumble and stutter and make yourself look foolish, if asked for these figures from your CPA, a tenant, or a  hard money lender, etc.  Plus, you won't know whether to buy or sell, or have enough money available for those emergencies or anything else, just because we were too busy to take care of one little item into QuickBooks or on a ledger.  Therefore, little things do matter very much!

So. this is a hot topic for me.  It never ceases to amaze me how so many people in whatever field of business they may be in, do not take into consideration before they jump into a business, to implement Office Procedures which includes handling their finances.  And that a software program is crucial to helping you know where you stand financially any time you need to see your data.  And sometimes you need to know something right now. This minute!!  

The reason?  They are too excited to get a business off the ground, and so they jump right into it, with no plan in sight.  No research on the Industry they pursue,  until they get their selves in a mess and then realize they should of focused on a filing system, financially software programs, websites, etc.  

I've also noticed that new investors have a habit of being cheap.  They pay a lot of money for the houses they purchase and therefore they say they are broke and so they pinch pennies.  They don't want to pay for the necessities they need to keep themselves in the black.  

Instead of financing houses and the extra things they need, like office equipment and other things pertinent to being successful, they don't.  They borrow just enough money for the house or they finance just the house, and depend on the rents they receive to pay for any extras, which is a no no.  Don't depend on your rents as income to purchase startup equipment.  Finance everything you need to begin this business (unless you have cash) and use the rents as income, which of course will make the payments on your startup money loan, which is what you do.  But don't use rents as your start-up funding.  Good grief, you're already putting yourself in the hole.  

Well, anyway, that's my rant on this topic.  I get that way at times.  LOL.  Take it with a grain of a salt.  My lecture is over.  :)

Nancy Neville

QuickBooks Online is not for Landlords...not really.

We have a lot to report to the IRS. Our houses are worth hundreds of thousands of dollars as the above poster posted. We need to keep detailed records on our properties. We have tenants that we need to report income and repairs from. We have laws we need to adhere to. Our industry is like no other. We are responsible for other people's lives. Therefore, we better develop good bookkeeping habits in order to protect our rumps in a court of law.

Quickbooks Pro desktop version allows us to customize QuickBooks to show everything we need to know about our properties, our tenants, our income, our expenses, our worth in a nutshell. Online only gives you a smidgen of what the desktop can do.

Plus Online is expensive. You have to pay a monthly fee. QuickBooks Pro Desktop: You pay a one-time price and it's yours forever.

Nancy Neville 

Here is a debate Question:  What is the best Lease Agreement to use?  A month to month or Annual?

I will start off.  

I prefer to have a Month to Month Rental Agreement. The reason being is that if it doesn't pan out,  all you have to do is give them a 30 day notice or a 60 day or a 90 day notice, depending on your state law.  

If you have an Annual Rental Agreement, then you are stuck with each other.  Now, the Pro's about having an Annual Rental Agreement is that you are somewhat assured of having a tenant for a full year.  However, not always, because a lot of times tenants want to leave before their Annual Lease expires. 

Many times landlords find some tenants hard to deal with and wished they had them on a month to month rental agreement, because they maybe controlling, or a pain in the rump,  always complaining.  Many issues.  

I see it this way.  Why complicate matters by having someone sign a lease for a year, when in the end, you don't have as much confident they will stay a year any more than a tenant staying on a month to month.  I have had month to month tenants who stayed for as long as 17 years.  Most of my tenants are long term, month to month tenants.  They usually stay a long time because they can leave any time they want and they feel more relaxed.

Even though the courts will hold a tenant responsible for the rent on an Annual Rental Agreement for the entire length of the lease,  the courts will also hold the Landlord for trying to rent out the property and show a strong effort to do so.   Both parties need to make an effort to rent the property out again.   And the Judge will decide which party didn't try so hard and award a Judgment accordingly.

I like to make my life simple.  Therefore, I always do a month to month rental agreement.

Nancy Neville

Next please

This doesn't make sense that a bank or money lender wants you to terminate a tenant when the unit is occupied. There is no credit history yet on these people to deem them unqualified to still live there.  UNLESS there is something?  

Another thing is no matter what, you have to adhere to their lease agreement and these tenants are allowed to stay until the lease expires, or for non-payment of rent, or for something they have done bad. 

You could run a credit check on these people to qualify them again for you and show the bank or money lender that they are Collectible and qualify as tenants. Or show them the credit report the former Landlord ran on them. 

But one thing for sure, that telling these people they have to move in 7 months when they just moved in without just cause for termination is going to bite you in the rump. 

Are they on a month to month rental agreement?  Or an Annual rental agreement?  

Something just doesn't sound right to me here. 

Nancy Neville

Actually the higher up you go in QuickBooks depends on how much data you need to enter and how much data this program will hold.  Enterprise Solution is for really big time investors.  Corporations, big timers.  Big Real Estate Markets that entail Brokers with a ton of agents, etc., 

A typical landlord who has one house or 300 houses can use QuickBooks Pro.  QuickBooks Premier is for people who have Inventory.  We don't have inventory. Our properties are not inventory. 

CPA's use QuickBooks over any other software program.  They would use QuickBooks Accountant Edition because this program entails all versions of QuickBooks and allows them to work with clients who use various versions. 

Nancy Neville

Keep things simple.  Many new investors think too much.  LOL  They make things harder on themselves and they end of spending lots of money.

With QuickBooks you are able to have one Business Bank Account, (or more if you want) but only one is needed per company. 

Then you have the Class Feature in QuickBooks, which allows you to link each property to income received and expenses paid out,  for each individual property, and this includes your office expenses.  So there is no need to have a bank account per property.  It is over-kill. 

QuickBooks keeps it simple.  But, because everyone needs a little bit of help with every software we purchase, we need to learn how to use it.  Once it is used, you are good to go, and everything is done quickly, and with very little time entering in your data per day or week or month.  

QuickBooks will  make it easy for your CPA to do your taxes, which of course saves you money. The more work they have to do to figure out what you're doing, the more they will charge you.  

Nancy Neville