All Forum Posts by: Reid Hanley

@Bruce Lynn good point.

We are purchasing a property via a quit claim deed that was acquired by the seller via a tax deed. The tax deed was issued in December 2017. We want to attain insurable title to the property and due to prior deed errors the only way to do it is to either quiet the title or wait the four years.

My question is does the 4 year timer that started on date the tax deed was issued start over when we attain ownership via the quit claim deed?

As a new landlord of a mobile home park in Florida, I have already experienced my share of tenants moving out in the middle of the night or with extremely short, as in 5 minutes from now and I still haven’t paid rent this month, move out notice. As such, I have become very leary of more move outs when tenants go silent when they are behind on rent. Today I decided to open the door of a rental unit that is 1.5 months behind on rent to ensure they hadn’t left in the night. After getting no response to multiple very loud knock attempts and calling out the tenant’s name I opened the door with my key and (SHOCKER!) she was home and not answering the door. She became very irate immediately telling me how dare I open her door. I did not enter the property at all as my feet remained outside the trailer at all times.

Have I crossed a legal boundary as a landlord?

@Michael Baradell we bought the property for $45K cash.  The rents were well below market rate ($350) so we immediately raised the rent to a little below market ($450) with no loss of tenants.  We are grossing a little over $16K per year with the increased rents.  As we turn over tenants we will take these to market rate, which I think is $550-575.  Once we have all three units at that rate we will be a little above $20K per year gross rents.  The homes were well cared for and had what I think is the best improvements you can make to older mobile home, new metal roofs with overhangs over all sides for water run off, already installed.   So our upkeep and repair costs so far have been low. I would buy everyone of these deals I can find. 

@Andrew Lewis  So far so good. We closed on it last June. We have continued to maintain the units and have luckily not had to worry about replacing them yet.    I do not believe we will be able to sub divide this parcel per county regulations, so we will operate this as an all POH mini MHP.

The 'work' is not only collecting rent but it is also maintaining the units. Tenants can do a lot of costly damage to mobile homes, as can mother nature.   At $300 per month profit (which is calculated as rent rate- lot fee - repairs - vacancy...so rent would have to be $500+ ) you are making $3600 per year.  The wrong tenant or a big storm can do this much damage easily and the year is a wash or worse you're in the red.  Staying on top of tenants and repairs is critical in this business. 

With all that said you can make a lot of money if you put in the 'work'.

@Reid Kurtenbach I agree with using FB Marketplace.  By the far the most replies i get come from there...but it borders on spam levels of replies.  Probably less than 20% are qualified responders I find...so careful using that as the true judge of demand.  

Test ad in the local paper, Craigslist (if there is a local page for your area), Penny Pincher magazine,...etc. will tell you pretty quickly if there would be demand enough to proceed.  IMO this sounds like a purely cash flow opportunity if the demand is there. Also keep in mind you will likely need to self manage/ repair this home to stay in the black on long term cash flow...so how easy it is for you to get to it and your home repair skill set needs to be factored in.  An important key to this rental model working is regular inspection of the property to make sure tenants are keeping the home in order.

I’ve recently discovered my new arch enemy…CONDENSATION! I’ve also recently learned the hard way that during due diligence you should always be looking for the presence of windows that open correctly and working exhaust fans in every kitchen and bathroom. You experienced MHP owners will say 'Well, duh", but I’m on MHP #1 and learning this lesson the hard way. So without this battlefield wisdom prior to purchase, I’m now dealing with a good bit of sill and casing rot and a tremendous amount of mold with the very wet winter we are having in NW Florida.

So I’m now looking for input on which exhaust vents are the right choice for my kitchens and baths. Most of my 23 units have the spring door style exhaust vent over the oven. These help, when used, (getting my mostly Hispanic tenant base to use them during winter is another discussion), but I’m wanting to install through the wall exhaust fans in all kitchen/LRs and bathrooms to get ahead of all the condensation in my homes.

Any input or recommendations on brands models that have had good success in the past is greatly appreciated!

Thanks BP!

Thanks Aaron.  I'd be a lucky man if we could get this park for this valuation, which would put it more in a 3-4x multiplier on revenue.  Which I think is reasonable.  I definitely need to listen into more of the Park Street Partner webinars.