All Forum Posts by: Rob B.

Theresa and Joseph have the right idea about this -- life happens. Much easier to communicate an arrangement with the tenant; I mean, yes, you can lock them up in litigation but they had a loss of a job. Honestly, there's no telling what the reasons are behind the loss of job (and while some may say, "not your problem" the reasons may lead to continued unemployment). It can become a much much bigger headache to pursue that path versus having some type of arrangement, and if they help you to get another tenant in there - great. 

Stephanie and Christine have the right ideas here. If you have a property manager they should have already done that for you. It sounds like you don't usually include reference checks as part of your screening, which is an easy way to ascertain whether or not someone has displayed signs of being a not-so-great tenant in the past. Their time at prior rentals can be very telling; it might be worth looking into a landlord solution that covers all steps of the screening process (something that allows you to easily screen tenants with a fully comprehensive application that includes nationwide criminal background check, credit score, credit history breakdown, eviction history, reference checks from prior landlords, and more). I'm hoping all goes well with this tenant but in the future, always a good idea to have your bases covered. @Gary B.

Hi Jacob, there are definitely a lot of helpful tools out there for tenant screening; *** and not to knock Cozy because a lot of people use them as well, but you can easily go with an option that will help you keep track of not just tenant screening but also can list and publish to 10+ listing sites, you can create and sign a digital lease with your tenants (making that whole process a lot more streamlined from application approval to lease signing), and also you can collect rent payments. You may run into transfer limits or extensive payment processing delays with some other apps which aren't necessarily designed for the purpose of rent collection but the right landlord software can make this seamless for you. Would love to learn about any additional needs; definitely helps to keep landlord solution providers on their toes! 

Hi John, a similar question on my end to what David mentioned; now that you've purchased the home are you planning on living in it first or plan on renting it out? Maybe house hacking? Not sure what strategy you're going for but either way, congrats on going after what you want. Now, I get not being able to pay super high bay area rent prices (I have quite a few friends living in SF and surrounding neighborhoods and rent prices are pretty crazy. I also get wanting to invest in a property, if it makes sense for what you're trying to do. David Greene and his team sound great. I just want to know a little bit more about the numbers behind this; love hearing about success stories from a numbers standpoint.

Hi Cameron, curious to know -- you mentioned that you've had the car a few months now (just noticed that the original thread was posted about 3 months ago, so kudos on that) but you just got your first turo booking. Seems like you got quite a bit paid down too in a short period of time. I don't really know too much of the backstory, but how were you able to tackle so much of that so fast (ie. being $5k away from fully owning in just 3 months? Did the deal close at a cost lower than you initially mentioned?). A lot of valid considerations/points of concern have been noted in the thread and a few come to mind for me being here in Chicago (ie. parking/potential tow costs or damage -- the renter might pay for the tow but your car can incur damage during that and I'm not sure what Turo says about this in its policies). Had a friend who was renting his car (a Benz) on Turo but stopped because of similar reasons others noted.  Happy for your success with this either way! Just want to know a little bit more about how you were able to pay down so fast.

Inclined to agree with what others have noted above, given the details. I wasn't aware that the sheriffs go around to the neighbors to let them know that an eviction is to take place (not sure if there's a difference there in terms of what your state law dictates but was unaware that they do this; nice to know!). Just based on the details which were provided in the initial post, since the person is being evicted, the natural assumption is that the property owner is the one who is doing the evicting, and the one who got evicted was a non-paying tenant (or some other clear violation of their lease). It would be a good idea to reach out to the property owner about possibly buying it from -- sounds bad, but maybe play up on the most recent situation; they just had to go through the process of evicting. Is it possible that this isn't their first eviction? Sure. But, they just went through it, nonetheless. Use some of that knowledge to guide/help you during your initial outreach (ie. managing rental properties can be tough with tenant turnover and the possibility of evictions). That's what I've got, just based on the details we have thus far. I hope this helps. 

Hi Andy. Good question; and you're at the right place. BiggerPockets has a lot of great resources and while I'm not based in the NY area, there may be others here who can provide some of the unique documentation you're looking for -- I'll defer to them on providing those samples. Now, having said that, there are a lot of tools that BP offers, but also there are tools out there that you can use to try and learn more about the entire rental ownership/management process (and also provides things like unique leases based on property address). BP is a great place to start though.

Spot on, Joe. That three-year lease payment upfront in exchange for lower monthly rent doesn't sound like the best type of deal at all. You'd then have to factor in market-rate increases on the front end before you sign the lease because 3 years locked into the same price could be detrimental to your bottom line objectives; there are also tax implications, and to your other point, tenants can still break leases (some of this depends on location/area but still..). I think it really does come down to looking at each and every situation as its own. A lot of great advice above.

Just came across this thread; I don't personally have any experience in this space but looking forward to reading others' responses to this topic/discussion. I believe one of my co-workers' parents owns a self-service car wash investment so I'll definitely ask. Looking forward to what others have to say here because I'm interested in learning more about this as well. 

Great question, @Eric M. -- and there are a lot of great pieces of advice on this thread already. Not sure where you're looking as far as investing, definitely are some simple things you can do (run water, flush toilets, run washer, etc) -- but of course, some of this depends upon whether or not there are current tenant occupants. Look for any obvious signs of water damage when first touring the home, and checking the meter is a great way to determine if there are leaks (as noted above as well).