All Forum Posts by: Colin Reid

I guess I'm behind on the podcast. I just started hearing about this, and I want to buy. But I want the extras, even if I have to pay for them. Anyone know how I can do that?

I have properties in different states managed by three different property managers. Each one uses Appfolio, and I have a different login for each one. Is there a way I can get all my properties together? This logging in/ logging out game is getting cumbersome.

As I understood it, the state of Florida preempts STR laws, meaning the local governments don't get to make their own rules. Local governments were allowed to grandfather in their existing laws, but no changes were allowed, except for removing all local restrictions and reverting to state preemtion. So if the City of St Petersburg, for instance, tried to change their rules, they'd revert to state law and be totally open for STR business. Did I get that wrong?

So it seems to me, with that understanding, that if you can comply with the law in whatever municipality you're in, you can bet those laws will stay the same, or revert to state law, but not get more restrictive.

I told my PM that we wouldn't disclose that I'm the owner, but we won't lie about it if the tenant asks. 

I have a PM in place for my house hack for several reasons. 

1. My W2 has me out of town a lot, sometimes with little or no ability to communicate for hours or months.

2. I know myself. If I self-managed, I would be a pushover. I would give them a couple days on rent, or let that dog stay, or whatever. So I hire someone else to be my "bad guy," and I'm not ashamed at all.

I had just moved to St Pete, determined to find a small multi to hack. I have an awesome agent who is also an investor, so she found me lots of good properties to look at, but they kept escaping me. I had my budget set at $400k. So that's when I found two.

The first was a quad, pre-market, still had some work going on, and they were planning to put it on the market in a few weeks at $450k. I told my agent to see what they thought about $400k, and she reported back that they were warm to the idea. But that place wasn't a good fit for me, as a personal residence, and I still needed a place to live. 
Around the same time, we found a duplex that was a good candidate for my house hack, so I put an offer on it and called a friend to partner on the quad. I sent him all my numbers, including the BP calculator, and he was in. He'd bring the down payment, and we'd split it 50/50. It was a cash cow!

An important detail here is that my W2 takes me out of the country for months at a time, and I had a departure date looming. I actually had a POA for my sister to close on my house hack for me, because I thought I'd be gone by the closing date. Feeling the time crunch, I told my partner that since it would be my first deal with a partner, as well as his, I wasn't comfortable risking his money when neither of us could be on site for closing, final make-ready, etc. He thanked me for being up-front about that.

Then the world shut down. I was stuck in the States, unable to travel to my worksite for nearly 3 more months. I  could have closed both, done touch ups that the 4-plex needed after the "renovation" the seller was botching, gotten it filled and been collecting a big pile of money every month.

I've lived in both cities. Born and raised in Baltimore, and was stationed in San Antonio for about 18months. 

My gut says San Antonio.

My mom is a realtor in Baltimore. My sister works for a big investor, with hundreds of buy-and-holds and flips in Baltimore and Southern PA. I have instant network of lenders, agents, familiarity with the territory, and other elements of a team. But I'll never move back, and San Antonio still feels like a better move to me. I don't have data to back it up, just a gut feeling.

A lot of the words you're using don't match your intent. 

You don't want to move, so you want to buy the home. It's not an investment. It's a home. So use a home loan. Conventional, FHA, 203k, etc. Hard money is for investors, and that's not you.

You don't want to spend your own money, or use your own credit. I don't think that's feasible. I'm not all that experienced but I've had my credit hard-checked on every deal I've done. I think you need to be a very experienced investor before they stop checking your personal credit. Seller financing may be the only method that you could get away with no hard credit check. Not if I was the seller, but maybe with someone else.

You said "attached home." Is that a row-home or townhouse, or part of a duplex or something? Does the landlord own the other units you're attached to? Is he selling those also?

If the landlord can't afford to keep it and fix it, that means your rent isn't enough to do that. So what will it cost you to hold, muchless repair and renovate? Possibly more than you're paying now.

Locks only keep honest people out, so how the lock was removed is sort of irrelevant.

I assume water is included in your rent, not in the tenant's name or individually billed. So the water expense comes out of your profits? 

In that case I'd remove the bib.

All my units are individually metered, with the bills in the tenents' names, so I couldn't care less how much water they use, or if they let the neighbors use it.

I might ask the tenants about it. Did they authorize the neighbors using it? Maybe give them a friendly warning that if the neighbors keep using it, you'll remove it. If they like having the outside faucet available, maybe they'll solve the problem for you.

I'm already regretting it. I rented out my first home 8 years ago, and just saw money-in money-out of the bank account. The account balance increased over time, so I was happy. Now I'm up to 5 units, looking to bring on investors, and I want a more professional image and a better idea of how my business operates. I tried to learn Quickbooks desktop version about 5 years ago, and I couldn't grasp it. I read a book on how to set it up, recommended from here, and still couldn't wrap my head around it. My CPA said he'd prefer QB when he does my taxes. 

I think it's time. I just took a Fundamentals of Accounting class from the local community college, and I think that has prepared me to tackle QB again. They also offer a QB course, which I might take.

I just heard about Civvl today, visited their website, and I'm still not sure what they actually do. They claim to be "the Uber of evictions." Basically it's a gig app to recruit process servers, workers to clean out properties, and something called "Eviction standby." The link for that last one is actually an ad. The website is riddled with ads, actually. It's pretty terrible.

This company has popped up in my social media feeds, usually from people outraged at them. I've seen numerous news stories about it (just google Civvl, and there are plenty), but none is very descriptive, mostly just outrage porn. They all direct the reader to believe Civvl is a Brute Squad for hire to come and Fresh Prince your poor, innocent tenants and all the stuff out onto the street.

I have never had to evict, but I don't think it usually involves a posse to forcibly remove the tenant. I usually hear about the Sheriff getting involved, and maybe a team to clean the junk out once the tenant is gone. 

Is there a market for this service (whatever it is)? I can't imagine hiring this particular company, for among other reasons, the bad press already associated with them. 

I'm really just curious about it, because whenever I see outrage on the internet I try to imagine the other side, and usually find some truth (if any) in the middle.