All Forum Posts by: Persa Z.

Riley Lucchesi what was your previous lock setup?

I'm wondering how often folks who are remote from a property end up needing to send someone to troubleshoot a smart lock.

I set up a smart lock on my STR location, and after the first guest using it, it ended up needing reset to the WiFi because it somehow lost connectivity. After being reset again, it worked for a few days of someone's stay and it's down again. It worked fine for the two weeks I was there right after it was installed. It's quickly becoming a "dumb lock" because I can't add new access codes remotely when it's down.

Just thought I'd see what others are experiencing.

@Mike Annunziata I'm not a lawyer, so I can't give legal advice. 

However, what my lawyer told me is that I could do it several ways:

1. Use the same LLC, but "Foreign Register" it in the other states where the properties are located that will be deeded to the LLC

2. Set up a new LLC in each state that the properties are located in, and deed the properties accordingly

From the few I have done so far, it seems like there's not a huge price difference in going either route. You have to pay yearly fees to most states regardless of the setup. The main concern is that if you have different LLCs, you have to properly maintain the paperwork for different ones. The "Corporate Maintenance" for many LLCs can become expensive and time consuming, as is keeping up with the accounting for each one. 

I learned a lot about LLC setups by watching Mark Kohler's Youtube, listening to Main Street Business podcast, and also reading his book, The Tax and Legal Playbook.

LLC setup for the purposes of Liability - protecting your properties or your personal assets, is a very complex subject. Hiring a lawyer to help understand your risks, and set up your LLCs, can start at around $800-$1000 and sometimes includes setting up the first LLC, but the knowledge they help you understand for your own personal situation is worth the money. Starting LLCs and running them incorrectly can cost way more down the road than doing it right from the start. Not sure how much you've already investigated the topic in general, but hopefully this helps beyond what you originally asked.

Hey Austin! Did you ever get an answer to this question? I'm in the same boat :) 

@Kevin Douglas I've gotten a lot of great referrals to service providers as I've been getting started by asking my real estate agent for recommendations. Does your area have a real estate investors group where you might meet and network with agents selling properties for the purpose of second homes or vacation rentals? 

Thanks, @Luke Carl. Do you have a service that allows multiple addresses to go to one digital mailbox? We'll have two addresses to contend with. And unfortunately, the mailboxes aren't on the property, but are in group mailboxes at the end of the street, so we can't get rid of it. 

Hello,

I'm purchasing a home to use as an STR out of state. I will probably use the home once a year for a short period, but the rest of the year I won't be there. What do people do with mail at their properties when doing STRs? I'm closing in January, so this is now on my list of things to figure out :) Would love to know what other people are doing.

Thanks for the help!

Thank you, @Sarah Brown, and @James Wise for the welcomes :)

@Gregory Hill thanks for reaching out! I'll send you a message :)

@Nathan Jensen Thank you for the the welcome! I'm excited to connect with you and learn from your experiences as a life long resident and a real estate lender! I'll reach out via PM. 

My story is that I've been renting the same place for 7 years in NE Ohio and I work by day doing web design work. For a few years before coming back to this town, I grew organic vegetables for other farmers in rural Ohio. I moved to this rental property to continue my side hustle growing food and running a vegetable farm closer to the city, but found out although that was my passion that I was never going to get anywhere selling vegetables - most of the time I couldn't even pay for my time working! I grew up in the Northeast Ohio area and have never really "left" or lived anywhere else (except a short stint in Denver).

My partner and I learned a lot about the Financial Independence movement in the last two years and have been saving everything we can and living as inexpensively as we can to help save up money for our first investment property. We've been listening to BiggerPockets for the last year and we spent this last year trying to buy a fixer-upper or a house hack in the Akron/Canton region and met a lot of challenges and deals that fell through along the way.

My partner's cousin lives outside of Twin Falls, Idaho and I fell in love with the area years ago. We were presented with a chance to buy undeveloped acreage neighboring my partner's cousin's house, where we could eventually continue the vegetable and fruit business once we have enough other income coming in from other businesses. (Ever heard the joke -- "What does a farmer do after winning a million dollars?" -- "Keeps on farming until it's all gone!")

We bought that property in August, so we'd like to move to be closer to that project so that we can start planting trees and berries, (things that take a long time to grow and don't need a lot of our time or attention) and also to closer to that side of the family. We have plans to make a camping oasis on the property to get some cashflow in the meantime. That will be a fun experiment in the "Short Term Rental" environment.

Our long-term goal is to start building a rental business using Single Family and smaller Multi-Family units. My partner is looking for a job in either Salt Lake or the Twin Falls area so we can move closer to the property in the next 3 months, and the plan is to find a Single Family home in need of help to live in and fix for a year, and hopefully find another a year later, rent the first out, and start growing one year at a time. It'll be a a slow road, but I think once we've done a few deals we'll be in a better position to try to grow faster.

If anyone has any good resources on the "live in rehab turned to rental" strategy, please let me know!