All Forum Posts by: Sandro Hagenbuch

Thank you all for the resourceful responses - it's greatly appreciated and helped me prep for the conversation! 

Hi all,

2 years ago I've become a landlord and am renting out my old apt (during the height of covid discounts in cities like NYC and Jersey City). Since then, most discounts are gone and rents seemed to have increase quite a lot. I sent my tenants a renewal lease to increase the rent by 16% which seems to be in line and still slightly under market but obviously were shocked. We've scheduled a phone call to talk about it. I do want to keep them as tenants as turnover is expensive and they're fairly good tenants. Can anyone give good negotiation tips? Aka, I would love to get the 16% increase, need at least 10%, but fear that I'll cave too quickly to 10%. Would love to hear some stories / experiences with similar cases! thanks a lot

@Jenny Zhang congratulations on your flip!

You wrote that this is a new construction. Does that mean you bought the land and built everything from scratch? 

Two tips for you for now though:1. get a credit card asap and use it minimally and pay back on a monthly basis. That way you build a credit score.

2. start the greencard process

Looks like you can only raise 3% per year if it's a rent-controlled as per 2017 ordinance. Also, with the amendment non-occupied 3-units or higher amount of units are rent controlled. Did I miss anything? 

Hey @Yoav Hougui! Welcome to the city. 

I moved here from Switzerland 2.5 years ago as well and bought my first apartment (primary residence) last year. I hope to get to multi-family houses in the next 18 months.

There are a ton of books! At the end of every podcast, the guest speaker recommends couple books. I have bought many different ones and found most of them very helpful but it depends what you're looking for exactly...

Hit me up if you want to connect!

Cheers,

Sandro

Not so scare you or anyone else off but such a re-evaluation just happened in Jersey City downtown and had a rather big impact on many building/apartment owners. Our neighbors' and our taxes were double to tripled. Obviously, most owners will appeal the decision but who knows the outcome...

As far as I heard, JC downtown didn't do a re-evaluation for a very long time which is the reason for the absurd increase.. You should check how long Bayonne didn't do a re-evaluation for that matter and be prepared (depending on your neighborhood) to have doubled amount of taxes. 

Please note that the tax increase for some owners is a tax DECREASE for others... this is only a re-evaluation and rebalance of taxing certain neighborhoods more and the others less depending on how they improved (or not) since the last re-evaluation... Mine improved a lot and hence got a hug increase... others in worse neighborhood will see their taxes go down by a lot... 

@Ryan Goldfarb I see your point... Just seemed quite expensive coming from NYC. I would imagine that due to the increasing (my opinion) competition among RE agents in JC it may lower the overall fee that's usually charged..

Hi all,

Has someone experience in selling apartments in Jersey City (Downtown area by Grove St) in the 800K to 1MM $ range? I would like to know what the typical RE agent fee is that I'd have to pay as a seller... I remember that when I bought it, it was 5%. This seems definitely excessive to me.

Thanks!
Sandro

could someone add me to the distribution list as well?