All Forum Posts by: Scott Decaria

Hey @Richard F Williams I'm an investor/agent in Utah with over 15 years of experience.  If you'd like to chat about some potential options message me and I'd be happy to discuss.

@Shalauna Thompson Thanks for the response. I don’t think I’d worry as much about it if I was living in the house. Most city are pretty lenient about owners renting out basement apartments especially if it’s long term. They seem to target the short term rentals more. I think the real issue for me is I won’t be living there, so I can’t control it as much. Like you say though, it really comes down to each city and how strictly they want to enforce whatever rules they have. Let me know if you find a place and how turns out. I’m still very interested in pursuing this.

@Scott Trench I’d reach out to Lowe’s, they are so much more responsive and community oriented. They offer what they call the “Hero Program.” Each store has $2500 every year to spend on their local community, plus they allow their employees a certain number of hour of paid volunteer time each year. I know this because I run a chapter of a charity (Sleep in Heavenly Peace) in my town that builds beds for kids that don’t have beds and Lowe’s has been an amazing partner, donating tools, lumber, and their time to help us building and deliver beds to these kids. Now that’s the kind of company I want to work with long term. We’ve reached out to HD and get no response.

Thanks for the reply Hattie, with the lack of Multi-family homes on the market, it sure seems like a SFH with a MIL would be the next best thing for an investor in a tough market. I wonder what regulations people have run into and if a city/county has ever shut someone down for dividing the two spaces and renting them separately. Anyone ever experience that?

Hello BP, I'm thinking about purchasing a Single Family Home that has a Mother-In-Law apartment in it solely for use as a rental.  The thought is to split it up and rent each section separately.  So it would basically be one unit upstairs and one downstairs.  I have a few rentals now, but I've never gone this route before.  Have any of you done this?  If so what has been your experience? I still need to figure out what the regulations are in my area, but I'm curious if anyone has pulled it off or tried and failed?  Thanks!

I had a fire in one side of a duplex. Got a call at 4 in the morning from the fire dept. Not a call I was happy to receive. The tenant left a pot of boiling oil on the stove and caused a massive kitchen fire. Luckily no one was hurt, but there was smoke damage throughout the entire unit. My insurance company payed for all repairs minus the deductible which was $1000. Total repair costs were over $35,000. Interestingly enough we had popcorn ceilings in that side that tested positive for asbestos and insurance covered the cost of removing that as well. The tenant did pay our deductible. The renovation took almost three months and during that time my insurance company payed us for the lost rent. What seemed like a horrible situation turned out to be a good thing in the end. We got a full remodel, rents were paid the whole time and during the process we actually made some changes like adding over head lighting and outlets. As long as you have good insurance. You'll probably come out ahead in the end.