All Forum Posts by: Nicholas W.

Put the lock box on. It's easier to break a window than it is to break a lock box. If someone wants in they will get in.

No, you can not wire 1 HW heater to 2 different panels, even if you did you still wouldn't know who was using how much power. You could just as easily have each tenant pay half of the gas bill now with no changes. This wouldn't technically be fair either.

You could install flow meters and prorate the bill but keep in mind you will have to go out there and read the meters every month or quarter and send them a bill.

The best (and most expensive) solution is to install 2 new electric hot water heaters and replumb each to their respective units. I guess you could also just install 1 new electric hot water heater for 1 unit and then just pass the gas bill on to the other unit. 

You need to try for $1700 if that really is the market rent. Sure $1700 to $1500 is only a 12% decrease which doesn't sound like much but what is the difference in your cash flow. That could take you from $400 a month in cashflow down to $200 or a 50% decrease which is pretty significant. Furthermore even if you had a turn at the end of a 1 year lease you will still be ahead $2400 which will cover a month of vacancy as well as any clean up for the turn.

I'm not an expert but I'm pretty sure I know the answer. An LLC is indeed a pass through entity but as such interest income is not reported on your Schedule C it flows directly to your 1040. Since the 20% deduction is based on Schedule C (and schedule E) income it would be the same whether in your name or an LLC.

So here is something I learned before getting into this: Rekeying locks is not that difficult. It's not for everyone, but if you're just a little handy it only takes a minute or two to rekey a lock. I bought a rekeying kit and a bunch of spare keys from amazon and watched a few YouTube videos. It's really not that difficult. Now I can use whatever basic knobs/deadbolts that came with the house and key them all alike, including storm doors. As a bonus I've set them up so that my personal house key is the master key. Tenants are happy because all the locks work with their one key and I'm happy because I can always open every door for any property, with 1 key that I already carry. On a turn I can just take another set of spare keys and rekey all of the locks in 15 minutes or so. The re keying kit costs less than one fancy smartkey/number pad lock, cheap and easy.

I might be in the minority but if it were me I would probably take a look at it and if it wasn't something obvious like a burnt out element I would just replace it. It's going to cost $100 to have a repair man take a look and there is a chance it can't be fixed cost effectively anyhow in which case the $100 is gone. If it can be fixed it will cost probably between $100 and $250 and you'll still have a 10 year old range. For $450 or so you can have a brand new one delivered and be done with it.

Maybe you should thank Mindy. 

What if an attorney found your post while building a discrimination case against you for a client after their application was denied.

I didn't read the post so I don't have an opinion on it but I do think we need to be conscious of what we put on an open forum, particularly when our full name is attached to the post as in your case.

Children run, children fall, it's a cost of being a parent but no one is to blame. 

If you're really worried about the sidewalk go talk to the city, don't sue them because your daughter tripped and it just so happened to be on the sidewalk.

I am not sure how graceful it was but it's done now. Thanks for all your help and encouragement throughout the purchasing process, I really do appreciate it!

Admittedly I am pretty new at this but it hasn't happened yet. My rentals are higher end so it's not something I'd expect to happen. Also most of my light fixtures are ones where the bulbs are not exposed, so it's less likely, but that's also the reason I use the LED's because I don't want them futzing with the fixtures. Honestly, if a tenant stole all of the light bulbs I would take it out of their security deposit and you can bet I wouldn't go out of my way to find a deal on them.