All Forum Posts by: Roger Garnett

Dan -

Check out the Southern Tier Real Estate Investors Association - they have a FB page, and used to meet monthly but no events since January. Some BP members, some not.  

https://www.facebook.com/pg/SouthernTierREI/about/?ref=page_internal

Roger in Ithaca

Ithaca is fully priced, easy deals few and far between. Solid student market. Cortland is *much* cheaper, many available properties, some student market to help fill units in parts of town. Also lower income level, and less appreciation. 

Yes, Ithaca is a solid rental market - and is fully priced as well. We've had a lot of new construction in Ithaca and Tompkins county in the past 10 years, and there is still little surplus. Because of the steady market, prices never really dropped in the recession, deals are harder to find, and margins can be thin. 

Roger - in northern Tompkins County.

A tankless water heater isn't designed for continuous duty cycle, or recycling the water, but for quick heatups. A guess without looking at the specs, but they probably wouldn't do well in that environment. Water heaters are also designed for lower operating temperatures than a boiler. Plus they don't include re-circulation pumps. 

Plus - if you are using electric to heat it, for that small of a space, you might as well heat the air directly with an electric heater unit or baseboard, and not suffer the energy loss heating the water. Another electric heat option - an heat pump stye air conditioner  with a heating mode. (be sure it's rated for 20 below +, some quit at like -10 or so.). A win-win - tenant gets AC, pays for heat & A/C themselves.

Thanks for the update @Christopher Stanis I can't make it down from Ithaca this month, but good to know the location has changed. It would be really great if a more regular attendee can add this meetup to the BP events listings -

https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/521-events-an...

Roger

Yup, as stated above, folks gather at the Brother's 2 Restaurant, 2901 Watson Blvd, Endwell, NY around 6:00. 

Doesn't matter whether they are across the street, or in another state - electronic payments beat checks in many ways. No collection, direct deposit, etc. You can try to use PayPal, but  there are plenty of rent payment systems that add additional functionality - like starting with the application and background check, all entered by the prospective tenant. They allow the tenant to set up their account, and either make one-time or auto-payments. The systems will send reminders, and even notice and bill for later payments. All worth the usually low per-transation fees, which get cheaper with volume. e-payments are the way to go. Quicken has a $1 payment system, but does nothing else. I use erentpayment.com, https://www.erentpayment.com/ which serves my current needs with the above listed features. There are other services which add service requests and other functions. 

Roger

Just to verify time & location for the Southern Tier REI - there are 2 threads discussing this group, this one says the

Vestal Library, 630pm, the other says the Brother's 2 Restaurant, 2901 Watson Blvd, Endwell, NY

Also, they say at 6:30, and recently 6:00 PM was mentioned?

Thanks

Continuing on with Sept 27, Oct 25, Nov. ?? Dec ??

Welcome Sam - BP is an amazing resource. 

We're still small - just a couple buy & hold properties, and learned great things here as we're looking to grow and invest in more properties.

I have a question for those who are members of the Tompkins County Landlords Assoc - I went to a meeting a couple years ago, but did not join, as I didn't seem much value. At the meeting there were no introductions, no general discussion, or time to meet and network with others. There was a presenter from the city (regarding sidewalk regulations), and then done, see ya. Is that all there is?