All Forum Posts by: Ryan Brouwer

 You are correct that I do not yet have a ton of investing experience.  I am constantly learning new things and I will continue to adjust my strategies and processes based on experiences I have as time goes on.  

I have been working in the healthcare industry for over a decade now and I am a firm believer in customer service and treating people how I would want to be treated.  There are definitely people out there that will treat others poorly no matter how nice you are to them, but it has been my experience that the vast majority of humans are good people and have good intentions.  Having said that, yes I am fully expecting to have tenants that absolutely don't care about anything and will be headaches.  I don't think it has anything to do with karma.  I just want to continue being a decent human being and treat everyone with respect.  If bad outcomes occur, then I know for a fact that its a problem with the other person/people, not me.

Thank you for your feedback. 

 I personally watched our lead tester do all the testing and there wasn't a single thing fake about it.  I suppose maybe somebody could Photoshop some results if they really wanted to.  

There could be potential for materials with lead in them to make their way into a property, I agree.  My understanding is that the city wants to minimize the lead content of areas in a home that occupants have the most exposure to, hence the testing is on walls, window sills, and other painted areas.  

My goal really is just to do my best to do the right thing by following the rules and laws that are in place for landlords, provide a good experience for tenants, and make some money while doing it.  

 As a new investor to Cleveland, I had spoken to my agent as well as property management about getting my properties lead safe certified and they both agreed that it was a good idea.  In fact, our property management company required the certification before they would be able to market the properties.  On top of that, other than the cost of getting the testing and certifications, why not do it?  I was able to get proof that my properties are on the up-and-up for lead levels, if I were to have had lead issues, it would have been a lot easier to address and remediate them while my properties are vacant vs occupied, and I'm protecting myself as an investor from potential headaches if the city does in fact start to enforce having this certification prior to evicting a tenant.  Sure, this COULD be a cash grab by the city, but maybe there are some good intentions behind it?  There is strong data that correlates lead exposure with health problems.  I want to do my best to follow the rules in whatever city I have properties in.  Whether I agree with the rules or not is irrelevant.  I want to provide the best rentals I can for my tenants and hopefully that will translate to happy tenants that will help me build some wealth down the road.  

If you are looking for some information about the process of getting your properties lead certified in Cleveland, here is some info from my recent experience this past month.

I just recently went through the process of getting two recently purchased properties tested so we can get the Lead Safe Certification, which is a requirement for landlords in Cleveland, OH.  There are a number of contractors that can do the testing for you and prices seem to range anywhere from $300/unit to $900/unit.  Here is the website for more information about certification and a list of vetted contractors:

https://leadsafecle.org/lead-s...

After reaching out to a few different companies, I found one that was a game changer.  Zach Burkons at PB Free Ohio (https://pbfreeohio.com) not only responded within 30 minutes of me sending an email, but he was super fast at going to take a look at my properties and schedule testing within a week.  Many of the other contractors were unavailable to even come take a look at the properties for at least 3 weeks.  Zach also helped educate me about the process and gave me some information that other contractors did not.  PB Free Ohio is not the cheapest contractor, but you get what you pay for and I would recommend him to anyone who is going to go through this process.

There are 2 year certifications and 20 year certifications.  The 2 year certifications require dust swab samples from multiple areas (windows, window sills, floors) of each room (not basements) and the exterior must also pass visual inspection.  The 20 year certification requires each of your properties to pass the 2 year dust swab tests AND pass a lead x-ray gun test.  The cost for the 20 year test was more expensive than just the 2 year test, but if you figure that passing this and not having to re-test every 2 years, you are saving a TON of money.  For PB Free Ohio, Zach sends over a tech that does a cleaning of the areas to be dust swabbed first, and then another tech comes by to do the dust swab tests.  Zach also personally came to the properties to do the x-ray gun lead tests.  

Additionally, Zach gave me information to get landlord incentive reimbursement from the city for the cost of the lead testing!!  At the time I did it, there was potential incentives of up to $750/unit for the 2 year and $1000/unit for the 20 year.  The city apparently has a bunch of money allocated to assisting property owners with lead remediation and testing, so take advantage while you can!  

https://leadsafecle.org/

Another thing to note is that the city is making it difficult to evict tenants if you do not have the lead certification on your properties, so if you want to avoid potential major headaches in the future, you should go through this process.  Also, making sure that your properties are safe for your tenants, especially children, so you should go through this process.  Do the right thing.  

If you have not purchased any properties in Cleveland yet and are looking to buy, I HIGHLY suggest that you do some research on this lead certification process and look closely at potential properties to see if they will need remediation or not.  The cost of remediation can be VERY expensive, so you may want to avoid having to go through this if you are looking for a more turn key investment.  Things to look out for are old windows, old wood siding, peeling paint on exteriors and interiors, and damage to window sills, door frames, and walls.  

Good luck out there!

My wife and I recently went through the process of getting an umbrella policy set up for out of state rentals we just bought.  We live in WA and our rentals are in OH.  We looked into a stand alone umbrella policy like it sounds like you are wanting, but as you have found out, they are very expensive.  The cheapest one we found was through RLI Corp and it was $950/yr for $1 million.  We had been with our home/auto insurance carrier for 15 years and didn’t want the hassle of switching companies to get a cheaper umbrella by bundling home/auto/umbrella together, BUT what we found out was that we were overpaying by a lot by staying with that carrier.  We ended up finding an insurance broker through Goosehead Insurance and they actually will shop around a whole bunch of insurance carriers and get you the best deals.  We ended up getting our home/auto for about HALF what we were paying before and then we got our umbrella for only $300/yr bundled up through Safeco (via our Goosehead agent). Obviously there are a lot of variables that go into calculating insurance premiums, so your situation may be a lot different than ours, but I HIGHLY recommend getting in touch with a broker and having them evaluate all your insurance.  Also make sure you have separate landlord policies for your rentals.  The broker can help you with those too.  What is also nice about having a good broker is that periodically they can re-evaluate your insurance and you can keep using that person no matter what insurance carrier ends up having the best pricing.  

Hi Rick.  I recommend that you stay away from the Azzam Group and RE/MAX Haven.  My wife and I are new out of state investors and I reached out to Michael Azzam in mid-November 2022.  At first, he communicated well, but after only 2 weeks of sending some emails back and forth, he said that his group did not "have the bandwidth" to provide us with "adequate support/availability".  I tried replying back after that email and he just ghosted me.  I thought this was really odd considering that we were simply looking at 1-4 unit properties to purchase in Cleveland and I found it hard to believe that with a whole team of agents, they were unable to help us purchase some property.  A real head scratcher.  The only thing I can think of is that he did not want to be bothered to answer questions that we had about the process.  

Since then, we were able to find another agent, Chris Schlenkerman (with RE/MAX Crossroads), and he has been absolutely fantastic! His communication is excellent, he is willing and able to answer questions and give honest feedback about properties (he doesn't just try to sell you on anything and everything), and he has experience with investment properties. Additionally, since we are out of state (Washington) and unable to do walkthroughs of prospective properties, Chris has been great about taking videos for us, which has been very helpful. We were able to get a SFR and a duplex under contract last month and we will be closing on both properties in a couple of weeks, all thanks to Chris!

With regard to RE/MAX Haven Property Management, you should know that they are part of the Azzam team.  We got in touch with them and Gabrielle Gratz was out contact person.  She was pretty good at communicating at the beginning (we began talking with her around the time we started talking with Michael), but she was not good about responding to emails and we pretty much had to call her to get a response.  When she was on the phone, she spoke very quickly and sounds very salesy.  Anyways, we felt like what they had to offer for management seemed fair and we still wanted to proceed to use them even though we did not have a good experience with Michael Azzam.  Over the course of the past couple of months, we stayed in touch with Gabrielle and kept her informed each step of the way once we made offers on properties and got them under contract.  Everything was going along just fine until the other day, two weeks before we are scheduled to close on our properties.  Last week starting Tuesday, I sent her multiple emails and left her multiple voicemails to try to figure out the logistics of getting our properties under their management and rent ready once we closed.  She did not respond until Friday and what she sent me was an email that said we could talk Monday and to schedule an appointment with her via her Calendly link.  I went ahead and scheduled an appointment as she directed.  Monday came and I called her at the scheduled time and it went straight to voicemail.  I emailed her and got no response.  She no call/no showed me, which is super unprofessional.  I was able to get the email address for the property manager David Terbeek and I contacted him about the situation to find out what was going on.  Well he didn't provide and explanation or answer my questions and instead he let me know that they are not currently taking on new clients!  ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!  After all this time of communicating with Gabrielle and having a plan to use them as our management company, they let me know two weeks before closing that they can't take on new clients?  Absolutely ridiculous.  

So, in summary, if I was you, I would stay away from both the Azzam Group, RE/MAX Haven, and anybody else affiliated with them.  

***If you still need an agent, definitely call Chris Schlenkerman at RE/MAX Crossroads.  If you need a property management company to help you with your rentals, George at Progressive Urban Property Management is super nice and will help you get set up as well.  I hope my personal experience story helps you on your journey.