All Forum Posts by: Dick Stevens

No, don’t accept.  This is a red flag.  He’s trying to get you to overlook negative things that you’ll find if you look hard enough.  Also, much harder to evict if he’s paid in advance.

One washing machine doesn’t sound like it would account for that much usage.  Check each unit for leaks - toilets, faucets, etc.  My guess is an internal toilet leak.  Can you increase the rent on the section 8 unit?  

I hope you did a bit more research prior to forking over $4k and drilling a new well.  Could have just been a pump or other less serious issue.  If you rented it with central AC as part of the agreement than you need to keep the system functional.  Tell her to submit maintenance requests via email if you don’t want the calls.  

You didn’t ask for a copy of the lease before you bought it?  Really?  How did you confirm the current rental amount?  Get a copy from the prior owner ASAP so you know what terms you are legally required to abide by.

It will be very difficult to be cash flow positive at the end of the month if you’re owner occupying one unit and only putting 5% down.  Maybe your expenses will get covered by the other rents, but unlikely you’ll have excess cash.

If you’re going to have a condition of buildings delivered vacant be prepared to get a lot of rejected offers.  This is a highly competitive market.  An offer requesting the landlord to evict all tenants will likely go right in the trash.

Any quotes you get here are not going to stand up in court.  Are you going to tell the judge your monetary suit is based on what your buddies on the internet told you it would cost?  Tighten up your game.  Getting 100% of the move in costs prior to signing the lease is day 1 stuff.  I think you should sell before you drive yourself crazy.

Start screening better.  Between this and your pit bulls post, a lot of things are getting by you.  I would recommend you start doing in home visits with perspective tenants.  Then you’ll catch all these problems before they become your problem.

Hahaha.... such random things to be worried about.  Be cautious if the prospective tenant tells you his name is Heisenberg.

Build some kind of a mesh guard, maybe out of chicken wire, so debis cannot clog the drain.  Pretty simple.