All Forum Posts by: Patryk Prokopiuk

I am buying a duplex, the seller (or should i say their agent that they communicate through) has been very aggressive, requesting “best and highest” offers from everyone at first.

I won’t go into details but we are in contract on the home that i bid 10K above asking (and already 20k above comps, but this is the market here right now and the math still works for me)

I agree to the price which is generous. Then have had all inspections done last week. There is a long list of things, i agreed to take on more than 50% of these 60+ big and large issues and requested the seller fix just the big items:

Both oil tanks are rusting and need to possibly be replaced, one missing a leg and sitting in cinder block.

Heating unit in one apt is 21 yrs old (life is 20-25)

No smoke/CO alarms

Electrical panel in one unit couldn’t be opened bc tenant said it sparked after recent storm

Other electrical unit has dual wiring and a couple cloth insulated wires (really old)

Deck is rotting and support beams sit on dirty not cement basing

The garage roof is at end of life

The garage walls are cracking & buckling

The response from the sellers agent is that they are not selling a perfect home and will only take 1-2 things to consider from a list of 60+!

Should i just walk away, take the hit of the 2-3000$ I’ve lost between all the inspections and appraisal fees and call it a day here? How can i have the seller be reasonable?

Closing on my first side by side duplex & will be living in one unit.

The other is tented out to a family for 10 years. So they are reliable but also underpaying the normal rent in this area by about $250/month (rate has not changed in 10 years).

Previous owner didn’t live there so the tenant also has 3 of his sons cars in the 4 car garage (basically took over it) and 2 more out side of the garage. One old Oldsmobile sitting in the side of the garage with overgrown grass and the other they use.

Now i already submitted and had my offer accepted but my wife want us to put in the contract that the tenant has to move out by closing. I told her we didn’t submit an offer with those terms and if we want to change it then the offer has to be changed and re-evaluated by the seller.

I get her perspective, i want them out but don’t see a way to do this easily or smoothly. How would you approach this?

@Ian Walsh can you elaborate more on investor friendly realtor please?

@Bryan Noth I definitely want to start with cash flow rentals. I see this as the most realistic route for me at the moment. I guess I just have to dive in and start being creative, My idea is to find the greatest gap between housing prices and rental price, this would give me an idea of markets that provide a good return. From there I would research those areas to find out which ones are going stagnant vs which are expanding & why. I will try this and see where I get :) thank you for your comment

@Michael Trimble I will try that, I work in search so it should be easy enough, just wasnt sure if there were sources already put together. Thank You for the advice!

My county is slammed with people moving out of NYC (think 10-20k ppl in last 6 weeks). Which has driven home prices up about 25% (i see houses that were 460 now 550, a rise in last 2-3 months alone).

So i want to invest outside of my local area but am unsure of how to identify good markets, any helps is greatly appreciated.

My local market is extremely volatile right now. Almost everyone here is an investor. Additionally it’s the most expensive county on the east coast.

I am a first time home buyer who wants to invest in a home to rent but I am unsure how to locate markets outside my local one that would yield the best returns. Is there a website or strategy to find such markets?