All Forum Posts by: Scott Brandt

I change them every 6 months.  The problem occurs when tenants have something go wrong and do not tell me about it right away

I assume that the cost to put separate meters on each unit would be prohibitive.  Who would have to pay the cost to do something such as installing meters for each unit? 

I have recently received several high water bills because the tenants have not indicated that they had a water leak.  Does anyone know of a low-cost remote monitoring system that I could place on my apartment building and adjacent building that would send me alerts during high water usage.   I have seen a few such as EKM water hero.  Any other good systems? My buildings have 5 units each with a separate water supply for each building

So, am I just a money provider or a property owner in these situations? The company representative has discussed buying a property, renovating it and then providing net rental returns.  Are you stating that I would be co-owning the property with additional people or, just  providing money for someone else to buy the property? I do not want to be a lender.  My goal is to be the owner of income-producing real estate.  Are we talking about 2 different concepts here from different departments of the company?

I like the option of having them do everything.  I am so busy with the properties I have purchased I would not be able to do the additional work handling them

Over the past year I have gone from having 1 tenant to 14 with relatively good success purchasing properties on my own and was able to retire last month at age 53. However, I have been talking with equity build over the past year and recently resumed talks about possibly investing in the properties.  However, I still would like to know more about the company  and their operations,, as I did hear that they did have problems in the past.  From some of the posts I have read, it appears  they have  corrected some of these problems now..  I am trying to decide if I should move forward.  Any advice would be appreciated..

I am currently looking into obtaining deposit only ATM cards for a tenant rent payment account.  Each tenant would have their own ATM card which only allows them to make deposits and no withdrawals.  All they have to do then is go to an ATM and make a deposit using the card.  I have a record of the deposit and who actually made the deposit and they have a physical location where they can make a payment.  I am still talking with them to find out the details but, was told that this is an option.  I am not sure if you can also do deposit by phone with such a setup.  This way people with money orders and checks or cash can all make deposits without having to locate me to make the payment.  I also have a record of the payment from each tenant.  They also have a receipt from the ATM

Thank you all for the comments.  You have provided some very good advice.  my daughter and I have actually discussed several of these topics already.  Especially getting everything in writing and speaking with other financial professionals prior to even purchasing our first home.

I have been a property claims adjuster for over 25 years. My daughter, Kristen, after a few trips and falls her first year or two, is now graduating college with straight A's in one month and has taken a very serious interest into home flipping and has actually educated herself substantially. She is also in the process of looking for a home with her fiance.

I am tired of the constant stress of handling claims continuously without ever having a break and receiving little pay for my efforts and am ready to create my own future. My daughter is very intelligent and has a burning desire to move into this type of business and I am blown away with the time and effort she has invested and the amount of information she has already learned. She is now educating me quite a bit. We both  believe that with her ability to find, analyze and identify the good deals along with my ability to walk into a property and identify any potential problems as well as costs associated with repairing it, I believe we have a good combination to start on this track. Additionally, I have a home that is completely paid for in a very expensive part of town which we expect to sell very soon, which will give us the financial backing to make a good start. Now we just need to start. However, we intend to educate ourselves as much as we can in order to minimize the amount of mistakes new investors can make when first starting out. Therefore, before starting, we are performing substantial research to assist us with this endeavor. I believe that we both have the mindset and the desire that we need to do this and will be very successful.

We also believe that a site like this will be a valuable resource as we begin our journey into this new phase of our lives and we both look forward to learning from the experiences other members have had that will help us to avoid the common mistakes that others have made in the past and are excited about interacting with other individuals as we move forward with our new endeavor.