All Forum Posts by: Rebecca E.

@Jim K.

That was an interesting article, not to say I agree with it. It lost credibility with me however when it cherry picked quotes from this site designed to make "landlords" look bad. I know most people here, and most people who are property owners who aren't here, are not the evil landlords they portray.

There's definitely a movement afoot to villainize "landlords" and I think it's the first step to national rent control/property limits. There's people out there who are actively trying to limit your ability to own more than one house, to "live off the backs" of tenants. If the general public sees us as neutral "housing providers" instead of evil landlords they may be less willing to vote in legislation which ultimately attempts to control our rights. To that end, I'm in favor of not using the word landlord.

As a woman, I'm more offended that they didn't mention "landlady" instead. LOL! Just kidding, I'm not a landlord, I'm the gender neutral, inclusive, non-offensive "housing provider"

Jim, do you participate in the "landlords are people too" happy hour they mentioned as happening in Pittsburgh?

@Grant Hasting

It's no mow may! Seriously though there's a movement about to not mow your lawn in May to provide food for pollinators. In my neck of the woods, the city is pushing it and they've halted all code violations for the month. I've signed up all my properties just in case so if the tenants don't mow, at least we won't get code violations.

We require all tenants to maintain the lawn according to city standards. The one tenant who can't do it has been told with the lease renewal we have increased the rent to cover the service. It costs $100 per month, but the tenant will cover it. If they don't want, then they'll move out and I will find new tenants at market rate, win win!

@Anthony Michael that's exactly the thing isn't it? Historically places like Wisconsin didn't crash as much as San Francisco or New York because they did not have the crazy appreciation and people in this area are very conservative typically with their money. If we continue those historical trends I think I'll be fine and if we decline I'll be slightly less fine

@Anthony Michael

It's interesting, and I'm out of cash right now so I'm just watching.

I'm in central WI, so a fairly rural, stable market. Boring, cash flow but appreciation until 2021 was slow, about 2-3% per year. I bought my first rental in 2019. The appraisal had finally reached pre-GFC levels. Since then, it's doubled.

Time on market here is still less than 20 days, no different for past year. Costs of houses go up every month. I'm looking for duplexes and the sold numbers for that type of assest has gone up 25% since summer 2021. The inventory is slowly increasing, but it's mostly fixeruppers hitting the market now.

@Austin Haynes

You can put extra drywall in the ceiling of the lower unit with a green glue product. I'm fuzzy on the details right now but home renovision is a YouTube channel with a couple of videos on soundproofing existing spaces.

@Joe Garretson

Hey Joe! I'm a buy and hold investor in central WI. Send me a message if you want to chat WI real estate!

@Curtis Mears

This is exactly how we do it. I found that putting our criteria out there from the beginning cut down on the number of serious candidates.

@Mariel David-DeVito

It sounds like you're trying to give a family a break, by offering your house at "what a family can afford" don't. Good deeds don't go unpunished. Fair housing will bite you in the end if you don't have clear reasons to accept certain families and not others.

@Caleb Smith

I'm curious what sort of answers you get, but in my experience, the attic, the sill plate, and windows are the best ROI for insulation.

We do rigid insulation at the sill plate with foam to hold it in place. This keeps the floors warmer. Our houses are Ballon framed houses from the 40s, where fiberglass insulation was shoved onto the sill plate. This is no longer considered adequate. Seriously just doing this (which I did personally over a weekend) helped tremendously.

We also had blown cellulose insulation put in the attic. This helped quite a bit.

When we remodeled the bathroom, we paid for spray foam on the walls to be done professionally. It's a vapor barrier and insulation and that room is the warmest in the house.

We self manage and do STR for professionals so are responsible for the heating. Keeping the costs down cheaply is important.

I have an external camera system on one of my LTR which is being rented by a single woman. She has access to it via the app so she knows she's the only person with access to it. She loves it and says that it makes her feel safer even though she's in a very safe neighborhood. I think it clinched her decision to rent from me instead of others.