All Forum Posts by: Reece Bierhalter

Nick,

I would start with an Engineer that does private land development.  I an a licensed engineer in Private Land Development in my 9-5.  I have worked on anything from a small 1 ac starbucks to a 2000 ac. Master Planned community and everything in between.  We work on behalf of and partner with owners and developers to navigate the city process and entitlements so that you can ultimate build on  your land, we can get you linked up with a Architect, and can even help during the construction phase.  We do a lot of front end due diligence works for our clients for free to try and make deals pencil for them etc.  Feel free to message me and we can take a look at it. Hope to hear from you! 

@Jake S. Thanks, I am leaning towards Cozy right now!  @Peter Tverdov Not looking for one I need to pay for which is why I was leaning towards Cozy.  I have a very detailed spreadsheet, but its a pain in the rear to instert receipts and invoices etc to tie it to all of that and requires a good amount of work every month, which is why I am looking for something a little more user supportive

I have finally come to the realization that I can no longer run the financials and handle all that is required to run a rental property in my head or with my manual spreadsheets I have created. It is just too much, and there is too much possibility to let things fall through the cracks. The main things that are important to me and what I am looking for are: ability to handle online payments, basic payment ledgers to track expenses and income, maintenance request portal for tenants, and the ability to set up some automatic emails.  I have begun looking at software's such as Cozy, Buildium, and Tenant Cloud; but I wanted to see what you all have liked and recommend.  I currently own and manage two units, however, I can't scale up until I get a system in place to make this management a little easier.  I do not want to pay a management company right now, as I would like the knowledge and experience. Let me know what you recommend or like or didn't like with software that you have used or currently use.  Thank you in advance for the help! 

Thank you for all the answers.  Tenant paid up with late fees on day 3, just so I don't leave you all hanging. 

The late fees are in the lease are laid out and in accordance with any state laws/regulations.  They build up on a daily basis as rent is late.  I just don't know how to apply, if at all the late fees once a notice to pay or vacate is provided.  

I provided a tenant with a 3-day Notice to Pay or Vacate.  The total amount is based on the back rent due, plus all late fees incurred up to the day I provided the notice. Per the lease I have an initial late fee, then a daily late fee after the initial fee.  My question is, do the daily late fees continue to pile up after the 3-day notice to pay or vacate is provided (meaning if its $20 additional/day, and they pay on the 3rd day do they need to pay what was due plus $60?), or does it stop adding up, and they have a set amount to pay in the 3 days? I have done numerous google searches and can't find an answer to this part of my question.  This is in Texas, btw. Thanks for all help in advance. 

I have a tenant that is under a housing voucher (HAP Voucher).  I get a direct deposit from the city they are in the program under every month, and the portion of the rent the tenant is responsible for is then paid directly to me by tenant.  Every so often, the voucher contract is reevaluated based on changing circumstances and the tenant/Housing Authority split will change.  Long story short, the amount had changed a couple of times, and I picked up the tenant portion of rent (via a MoneyGram money transfer) and went back to the contract to verify if it was the right amount.  It was short by $200. Had I realized it wasn't the full amount, I probably wouldn't have picked it up in the first place, but that ship has sailed.  Initial late fee is $150.  Tenant paid me $200 on the 4th, and asked if the late fees would stop.  I informed tenant that according to the lease, all payments are applied first to non rent related charges then to rent and late fees would only stop once tenant was current on account.  So that $200 payment was applied first to the $150 late fee, then the remaining $50 to rent.  So now on the 4th tenant is $150 short on rent, and every day an additional $20 late fee is added until account is current.  It is now the 16th and I still have not heard from tenant, and I have provided tenant with updated late rent notice every day with updated amount to which tenant has not responded to.  Knowing that I have accepted partial rent payment, Can I or Can't I post and enforce a  "# Day Notice To Pay Rent or Vacate" ?  This is in TEXAS.  I am quickly learning that there is a better way to handle this altogether from the beginning, but I am needing to fix this now, and can't change what I have done.  Thanks for the help in advance.  Side note, this tenant has also just lost their Housing Voucher, so I have a feeling I may have to evict said tenant sooner or later because they no longer have the rent supplement. 

First make sure there is a "due on sale clause"  However unlikely, you may be one of the lucky that it was left off mortgage all together. 

I am always looking for ways to leverage.  As a landlord, the more properties you acquire, the more cash you will have to deal with and store.  With every rental comes a sizable security deposit that you will hold onto for generally a year or longer.  Have any of you considered or do any of you put that money into a CD equal to the length of the lease so you can gain a significantly greater amount of interest on that money you will hold onto for the foreseeable future rather than letting it sit in a low yield savings account. There is a significant difference in yield rates on a short term CD and a savings account, sometimes up to a 50x difference.  I know there is always the possibility of having to pull that out earlier if something happens with the unit or the lease agreement, and with that would come penalties in the CD route, but the possibility of penalties vs the potential gains may outweigh the risk, especially if you keep a certain percentage as a back up and not place all security deposits into a CD account. I am curious to know if anyone has considered doing this, does this, or if it is even legal, etc.?  Once you start to get in the thousands of dollars in security deposit value, you could gain a few extra hundred dollars at the end of the year, and you could keep compounding the earnings into new CDs and eventually a snowball effect will be created.  All thoughts are welcomed.  I am located in Texas for clarification on local laws.

Hey Brandon,

I am looking for my next deal.  Can you email me what you have available?

[email protected]