All Forum Posts by: Rob S.

If your state has a strong contractor licensing board as in Oregon, and if the contractor is licensed in your state, you may be able to recover your damages by filing a complaint with the licensing board. If the property is in Maryland, it looks like the licensing agency is the Maryland Home Improvement Commission. Per their website http://www.dllr.state.md.us/license/mhic/

"The Commission has a Guaranty Fund (The Fund) supported by licensed contractors, who pay a Guaranty Fund assessment when they obtain their Home Improvement license and each time they renew their license. This Fund compensates homeowners for actual monetary losses due to poor workmanship or failure to perform a home improvement contract. The Fund applies only to work done by licensed contractors. The maximum amount that a homeowner may recover through the Fund is the amount paid to the contractor, up to $20,000. If the total amount of all claims against a contractor equals more than $100,000, then each homeowner’s award is pro-rated based upon the total amount awarded to each claimant" 

Go to a different bank that will do delayed financing for you. If you paid cash, you should be able to get back all your purchase price + closing costs almost immediately for as long as the property's appraised value will support the loan amount at the LTV that the bank will allow. There is no seasoning required in delayed financing

@Account Closed I LOL when I saw that in the news. I at the same time feel sorry for the poor landlord. Just hope he has learned a valuable lesson

You can depreciate the actual purchase price + the actual cost of capital improvements that you made to the property prior to placing it in service less the cost of the land. That means that if you did some capital improvements during your rehab and the rehab was completed before you rented out the property, then add cost of those capital improvements to your purchase price and subtract the cost of the land and that will equal your property's adjusted basis for depreciation. You can find the value of the land using your county's property records. I am not a tax expert so you may want to confirm from a cpa or tax professional

Congrats! Looks like you have found a diamond in the rough

@Account Closed That should be the same property. It's the white 4-unit with basement accessible through the back. I think it's Fannie Mae owned. In fact, we have lost count of the number of houses we lost to higher offers that are way above asking. But the returns on the ones that we do get make it worth it. Happy Hunting:)

I feel your frustration. Portland is red hot right now. We put in an offer full price on an reo fourplex on ne Lombard among others and were certain we were going to get it, guess what la's email said "your offer is rejected, seller has decided to go with a different offer". It can be very frustrating but we never give up. You may also want to get into direct mailing, cost intensive but when one clicks you are sure to make a nice return. 

We would mail them their security deposit if they gave notice, moved out before April and left the house in good condition. If they sued for their deposit, your legal costs to prove that they caused the "nice sized hole" in your wall and "$700 in unpaid rent" may not be worth it in the end. Good luck

Direct mailing works great when you are starting out. Buy a list of new home owners in the area you are targeting and mail them "welcome to the neighborhood letters" with a coupon. Once the calls start coming in, make sure to answer and do a great job for them and they will tell their family and friends. Then you don't need to market anymore... The sky will be your starting point in construction services if you do great work and gain word-of-mouth referrals. Hope this helps. Good luck!

In cash-flow markets running the numbers by assuming 100% financing will be the best metric but using 100% financing to analyze properties in an appreciation market will almost always result in negative cash flow. Does this mean investors shouldn't invest in appreciation markets? No. Bottom line is: know your market, learn what works for you, take action and repeat.