All Forum Posts by: William Coet

Will Banks Give a 30 Year Mortgage to a 70 Year Old to purchase a single family home they will occupy?

As the title states, are there ways to reduce construction costs below $100/sq.ft for small scale multifamily (10 units or less) while still building a quality product?  Quality meaning strong, dry and durable but with lower cost finishes. 

Can this be accomplished using workers who are laid off from seasonal work, or laborers who are experienced, but maybe don't want to be grinding away at high volume, quota based work?  For example, occasionally there are guys who left union work because they want don't want to travel, and they pick up odd jobs that allow them to stay close to home.

Originally posted by @Scott Mac:

I strongly doubt they have had a survey done, and the permits for drilling a well and a septic field are probably outrageous.

And wait until the tax bill comes.

Maybe you should wait until they build a Home Depot up there though.

Sh*t flows uphill on the moon

Originally posted by @John Casmon:

If they're providing relaxed penalties to renters, they should at least provide similar terms for apartment owners with our hard costs on taxes, insurance and utilities of these properties. If I could tell the utility company that the tenants didn't pay so they just have to wait and can't charge me late fees or turn off service, I wouldn't really see a big issue here. But of course, it doesn't work like that.

Exactly. The legislation should include that if a tenant stops paying then the landlord is also protected from late fees of all banks, insurance companies, property tax collectors, and maintenance providers.

Are there any good property managers in the area?

New rent laws recently went into effect in New York State on June 14.  There are advocates for these laws that claim "housing is a human right".  Landlords everywhere need to realize this is a dangerous concept and contact their representatives to explain the problems with this type of legislation. The concept that housing is a human right is a political tool to win votes that has led to the government supporting tenants who want to pay late and prevent landlords from charging legal fees to enforce the payment terms of the lease (see specifics below). It should be alarming to anybody paying attention that there are people who believe government should use legislation to take control of rental property. Landlords are the ones who pay mortgages, taxes, insurance, and maintenance and they are faced with late charges and harmed credit if they do not make their payment on time.  Landlord organizations need to take action and contact their representatives to stop this government takeover of their property.  

"Housing attorney Nicholas Miraglia, from Burgess & Miraglia,

specializes in evictions. He said that he handled more than 3,000

evictions in Rochester, Buffalo and Syracuse last year and noted three

key changes for renters.

The first change is how landlords can demand late rent. Under the old laws, a landlord could simply ask for late rent and that would be considered a legal warning. Now, a landlord needs to hire someone to serve a notice to a tenant, telling them they have two weeks to pay or they’re headed to court.

“The only thing at this point now recoverable is base rent only,” said Miraglia.

That means if a tenant is taken to court, a landlord can no longer ask the tenant

to cover a landlord’s legal or late fees, the second key change in the

laws. The final key change can stop an eviction. If the tenant can’t settle on an

arrangement with the landlord in court, they can pay the base rent

without late fees, and not be evicted.

“The tenant could say oh… I have the thousand dollars that I was supposed to

have a month ago and by law the whole thing starts over again,” said

Miraglia. He also noted that with those new laws the landlords are on the hook for their

own legal fees, and costs to serve notice to tenants. They also lose out

on late payment fees, which landlords may have used to pay bills for

those properties. If tenants pay late, then the landlord may be late

with their payments.

“There’s no corresponding changes for landlords to pay their bills 14 days late,”

said Miraglia. “You know their mortgage is always going to be due on

the first. Their water, their gas bills. So 14 days seems a little

extreme to me. It was an emergency, overnight,apparently. These laws

were passed with very little if any time for feedback. And I think that

the changes were too drastic.”

Housing advocate Ryan Acuff of Rochester’s Citywide Tenant Union thinks all the changes are a good start toward housing justice.

“People are starting to realize that when our tenants have basic rights the

community benefits as a whole,” said Acuff. “This emergency tenant

protection act will work with habitability issues because tenants will

have more protections against unjust evictions.”

But for Acuff and other advocates for housing rights, the new laws are not enough.

“You know there’s no one law or one thing that’s going to achieve total stability or housing as a human right so we need this and many other tenant protections,” said Acuff.

A recent discussion regarding 15 yr vs. 30 year mortgages got me wondering about this; When considering a borrowers financial statement, do banks consider equity in a property the same as cash?  Do they value cash more than equity? 

Thank you

Isn't equity in the property the same as cash when a bank is evaluating a financial statement?  Therefore if you have a 15 year you will have more equity in the property than you would with a 30 year and less cash, but it doesn't matter to the bank.

It seems inevitable that the property tax revenue will decrease because people will be forced to pay less for property and assessments will go down.  I'd like to hear a differing opinion if one exists.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but banks don't see a difference between equity and cash.  If you have a 15 year note you will have more equity in the property and less cash, but don't banks treat them the same?

Also, won't most local banks work with people to refi from a 15 year to a 30 year in the event of an economic downturn given their credit is still in good standing?