All Forum Posts by: Sarah Miller

Ramsey and Orman are nothing but paid speakers/celebrity faces for financial firms that follow the financial strategies which they teach.  Many of these kinds of people for example will tell you to only hold term life insurance and to NEVER buy whole life insurance when actually whole life insurance is one of the best savings vehicles available! (And the reason I was able to purchase 2 duplexes right off the bat).  This is like saying to NEVER buy a house and to only rent.  "no Sarah, don't purchase that asset that will grow in value and build equity over the long term which you can borrow from, you only need a house for right now so just rent it and throw your money away instead!"   -rant over :-)

O trust me I know that they can find info if they wanted! (although none of that was true).  But my thoughts were if they had to work for it then they would be less likely to throw rocks at my house!  Go to Spokeo.com and sign up for a free trial if you really want to see some stalker info.  I know multiple ways to look up people's information.   

Hello again!  So, this question is stemming from my fears of angry tenants.  I do not want my home address to be known to all of my tenants.  However, it would also be very nice to be able to get rent checks and other business related information right to my home mailbox.  Is there a way to somehow have a 'fake' address that will still forward to my home address?  I don't really want to have to set up a P.O. box and have to make that trip multiple times per week to the post office... 

Sounds good. Thanks! Hopefully I can get a renter because it will really increase my cap rate!

I did a quick 50% rule and it didn't look very profitable (mainly because taxes are so high).  For 300k I think it is really over priced, It would have to be at least $75k less for me to even consider it.  Although I am still a newbie myself so I'd like to see what other people say!

Thanks for all of the great advice!  One question though, if I do not permit myself to have a key, how am I supposed to lock them out or be able to get in without breaking a window/garage door/heavy man door??  Also, is there typically a 'waiting period' of non payment before I can lock them out and sell their stuff? (an entire month? 2 months?)

Hello BP!  Been awhile since I posted.  We have been very busy with our 2 duplexes we purchased within a week of each other! 

Anyway, our one duplex actually has a 4 car garage (2 2-car garages for each unit) and it also has an additional narrow garage along the back that goes the length of the building (approx. 12x45-ish... didn't measure, could be slightly bigger).  Anyway, we are going to rent this additional garage space out for additional income on the property.  Planning on charging $200/mo because of the size but what should I know about renting a space like this?  Do I really need to screen the renter?  Should I require a 3 month lease or is month to month pretty standard?  Should I require a deposit of any kind?  Do I need to draw up a formal lease for them to sign or can I find one somewhere?  Also any wise words would be nice.

Thanks!

Exactly.  I don't really want to deal with this!! Especially since his forwarding address is just a few blocks away!  Definitely just going to compromise.  I have a new tenant already lined up and I'm excited to get her in instead!

@Michael Noto No I'm letting him leave.  The question was that he wanted his security deposit back and I didn't think it was fair for me to have to give his deposit back when he's leaving a month and a half early.  But he thought he should still get it back because he thinks his lease automatically was void when the property sold (so he doesn't think he's breaking the lease early)

Thanks everyone.  My personality tells me to make him hold to his contract.  However, I really don't want to deal with this guy anymore.  I think I am going to explain to him what I COULD do (keep his entire security deposit and attempt to collect unpaid rent for this month), however I am just going to keep the portion of his rent to pay for his unpaid rent for this month and return the rest.  Hopefully this will just piss him off but keep him content enough to leave it alone.

As always, thanks BP!