All Forum Posts by: Ryan Short

Sky's The Limit, BRRRR!

Anthony Massarone from Harbor One Bank is a good broker, he is out of Mansfield, MA.

I bought a 4 family property in June. I have been doing a full renovation to the second and third floor units. The first floor has 2 units with leases, a 1BDRM and a 2BDRM. The second floor has a 3BDRM unit and the third floor has a 4 BDRM unit. I was working on the second floor a couple weekends ago when my tenant came running in saying there is a lot of water coming from the ceiling in the food pantry. So I ran down into the basement and shut off the water main. The bathroom was just finished on the third floor that day. One of my workers flushed the toilet for the first time since the summer when he installed the new toilet. I went above where the leak was on the second floor, which ended up in the food pantry. I found out that the previous owner put a small access wall at the bottom of the pantry/closet. That's how I found out I had a inch wide crack in my cast iron stink pipe. So I called a pipe lining company who put a camera down the pipe and found out it was a 10 foot long crack spiraling down the pipe. The pipe lining company quoted $6500, I guess it's $4000 just for the truck to show up. So I knew it would be cheaper to get a plumber to do it but that would also probly cost over 3000. So my brother and I wanted to open the wall for the plumber to save money. We cut out a small wall, floor to ceiling. That's when we figured out we could probably cut out the cast iron pipe and do it ourselves. We ended up rented a cast iron pipe cutter and buying pvc and grommets that we needed. All in all, it took 5 hours and about $200 to cut out and install 10 feet of a stink pipe. As we were doing this another pipe started leaking under the floor in the closet. So we ripped up a small 2 foot section of the floor and replaced the corroded hot water pipe. I'm so lucky and happy that all of the piping in my house is in a chase so 80% of the water went down into the basement. The floor and wall was already opened so we cut out most of the old copper and steel pipes and replaced them with pex pipping. I'm so glad this happened when the top 2 floors were vacant. "What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger"

Thanks everyone for all the feedback. I completely agree, there's a lot of things that could happen that would not be repairable. I am going to have my electrician do the work. I will try and save money in other areas like cabinets and floors to make up for the cost.

Hi everyone on BP, I recently closed a 4 family house in Massachusetts in June. The house has a 1BDRM, 2BDRM, 3BDRM, and a 4BDRM. The 1 BDRM and the 2 BDRM are rented from before and are close to paying for the mortgage. I have been renovating the 2 other units the past month and have gotten a lot done. I have been researching as much as possible about running electrical wire and adding lights and outlets. I'm just starting out and I'm only 23 so I don't have a lot of reserves but I do have some credit available. I got a estimate from a friend of a friends electrician, and he came in at $2400 for adding 10-15 outlets, 4 or 5 lights, and adding 3 or 4 circuits. I can't really afford to pay that but will if I have to. I was wondering what's the best and easiest way to run electrical wires through plaster and laths. I could run some off old circuits but I'm going to have to add a couple new circuits no matter what. I was thinking about doing what I can then have him come back and give a new estimate. I also would like to cut the smallest amount of walls possible, for repair reasons. I found a way to run the wires up to the 2nd and 3rd floor but not sure what to do when I run into old plaster. Also this is an older home that has some electrical conduit in one or two rooms. So that is an option but most of the units is getting renovated, just don't want to outdate anything if I don't have to. Thank you in advance for giving any advice!

Hi mike, I would see if the owner would agree to fix the roof with his money then add the cost on to the purchase price. This is what my brother is in the process of doing.

There's good properties everywhere, you just have to be the first one to find them. Just keep checking the towns your looking to buy into. You will find one within a month just make sure you don't miss a day looking at those towns, it only takes 10 minutes.

Hey Henry, I'm sorry about the bad inspection, it happens more then you'd think. It's always better to have a bad inspection then a good one and find the problems out later. Take your time to find the right property, 2 or 3 units, as long as you use the BP calculator your golden. Just have a set cash flow goal that you want to meet before jumping on a deal. The awesome thing about the bad inspection is that you are that much more experienced in real estate investing. I wish you the best of luck on the next deal which is going to be 10x better.

Welcome David! Thanks for the post,

I also agree with these 5 issues but you also have to remember that everyone in Massachusetts has to deal with these same issues. So everyone in Mass should be adding and calculating these cost into the final offer. Whoever isn't is working at a unfair advantage. As long as you know your area and what your getting into, it shouldn't be much different then any other state. As long as a investor does there due diligence they should plan accordingly.