All Forum Posts by: Kyle J.

I know Union Bank is one. 

@Travis Frenchak She’s not trespassing since she’s your former tenant.

If she doesn’t leave voluntarily after receiving your notice of non-renewal and at the end of whatever month she’s supposed to be out, then as @Frank Procopio pointed out, at that point she’ll be considered a holdover tenant and you’ll need to proceed with an eviction.

Good luck. 

@Daeun Lee There’s been some interesting/bad advice given by a couple people thus far, in my opinion.  

No, you should not just “make one up” when asked by a lender for a tax return in order to get a loan. That’s a terrible suggestion. Lenders will have you fill out a form (IRS form 4506) so they can get a copy of your actual tax transcripts and verify that against what you submitted to them. So no one should be doing that.

As for getting a hard money loan, I would not recommend that in your situation based on the facts you presented. Hard money loans can be a great option for certain people. For example, a fix and flipper who will be exiting the property in a relatively short period of time via selling it. Or even someone who is going to BRRRR a buy and hold, IF they already qualify for a conventional loan and plan to exit the HML into the conventional loan before the HML comes due.

However, where a HML is NOT ideal, is when someone can't get a conventional loan and they want to purchase a buy and hold property. (This sounds like your situation.) The problem with this scenario is, you don't have a solid exit strategy and you have a high risk of getting stuck in the higher interest HML with no ability to pay it off before the term is up.

You need a solid exit strategy (e.g. sale of the property, already qualified for a conventional loan, etc) before ever getting into a HML. Otherwise, you're setting yourself up for failure. And as I read what you wrote, you want to hold the property and you're not sure if/when you'll be able to qualify for a conventional loan. Which just reinforces my point that a HML is not a good option in your situation.

Anyway, just my two cents. 

Not in a million years.  Especially since it sounds like she expects it to be an interest-free loan.

The closest I've ever come to doing an interest-free loan for a tenant is when rent is due on the 1st of the month, late on the 2nd, but they technically have until the 5th to pay me before a late fee kicks in.  As far as I'm concerned, if they pay anytime after the 1st, but before the late fee kicks in, that's me giving them an interest-free loan.  :)

@Maureen Santibañez You don’t mention what market rent should be for this property, and I’m not familiar with your market. However, $800/mo sounds crazy low for a 3 bdrm, 2.5 bath, 2-story house with a garage and “all bills paid” in most any market. 

That, combined with some of the other things you mentioned (e.g. the “landlord” telling you to enter through an unlocked back door, the owner/landlord not personally meeting with you, his name not matching up, poor phone connection, etc), has all the signs of a scam. And there’s certainly an abundance of those online, especially on Craigslist (where I noticed you found this particular ad).

What usually happens is a scammer (often times from out of the country, which could explain the poor phone connection) hijacks a legitimate ad and uses their photos to place a similar ad but with a much lower rent amount. The scammer then collects as much as they can in the form of a security deposit and/or first month’s rent from unsuspecting applicants before they disappear.

I’ll teach you a little trick though...if you save one (or more) of the photos from the suspected fake ad, and then search those images using Google’s reverse image search tool, you can often find the REAL ad. (Along with the real rent price and real owner/landlord’s contact info.) 

But if you’d prefer to not do the detective work and just move on, that’s a safe bet too. Sometimes if something seems too good to be true, it usually is.

I couldn’t imagine not cleaning a place before renting it out. I have professional cleaners (who are amazing!) come in and do a deep clean after tenants move out and before I re-rent it. In fact, I won’t even show it until that cleaning has been done because first impressions are everything.

I always get a lot of comments from applicants on how clean my places are (and sometimes how dirty other places they’ve previously viewed were). Probably why I’m able to rent mine so quick when I have a vacancy (usually in a matter of days).

Nobody wants to rent a dirty house. 

@Oscar Tol 

Because of the relatively new CA statewide AB1482 law, you actually can no longer simply terminate the tenancy of even a month-to-month tenant if they’ve lived in the property for over 12 months unless you 1) fall under an exemption to this law, or 2) have “just cause”.

So the first thing you need to do is figure out if either of those two things apply.

Here’s some FAQ on AB1482 to help get you started: 

https://cal-rha.org/legislative/ab-1482/

Not sure what a "heater vent problem" means, but for minor issues (like a stained ceiling) that are quickly resolved where the house is otherwise habitable, I would not get into the habit of reducing the rent.  Especially for a new tenant.  

Whatever you do now is going to set the tone for the entire rest of the tenancy.  Believe me, things are going to happen from time-to-time.  It's inevitable.  All you can do is respond to them quickly and professionally and get them resolved in a timely manner.  Just doing that will cost you.  But if you also get in the habit of issuing the tenant a rent reduction on top of that every time some minor thing happens at the house simply because she finds it "inconvenient", well you're never going to make any money in this business.  

 It's down at the bottom of the screen under "Explore":

@John Joyce  Check in the File Place.