All Forum Posts by: Paul M.

Can anyone provide or direct me to actual examples of residential cost segregation studies?   EG that would show how much was paid for property and a complete breakdown of what was put in each bucket.   I'd love to see actual reports.    There are lots of posts talking about it conceptually, my CPA is lukewarm on the strategy and says most of engineering firms overstate the benefits versus what actually gets reclassified.      Like I get the concept, I am a financial accountant myself, but I've never seen the execution, and in previous posts I've read, there are not both detailed and concrete examples.   

Is this a commercial or residential property?  What % of purchase price was moved into faster depr categories?

What is the best way for a landlord to get setup to be able to accept credit card payments for rent?   Volume will be very low but sometimes if it means getting rent minus ee that is better than nothing.  Paypal?  Intuit?

@Dan Travieso when was your last renewal?

Is Covid 19 causing water bills to go up?   I would think so though in some cases tenants are staying at their parents' or significant others place so some are using more, some less.    Do you have more or less trash then before, seems about the same to me.    

My employer has 25 buildings, and the umbrella insurance renewal thhis spring is a 55% increase.    Our broker has told us the umbrella market has tightened considerably due to poor loss experiences for residential and all of her client's umbrella premiums have gone up.   Our previous umbrella carrier actually dropped us due to underwriting guideline changes.   We've never filed a claim on an umbrella policy.   We have filed claims on primary policies.   I have no reason to doubt what she is saying just looking for some confirmation of other's experience.  I don't really understand what was special about the last 12 months (according to her narrative the tightening started before Covid 19) then the years prior to that.   

In my state it is illegal to take that much rent in advance, even if tenant offers.   If it was a new tenant you should run as it will turn south once the 12 months is over.   It sounds like for an existing tenant they just want to save money.   Good for them, but I wouldn't do it.

They are great, low maintenance, easy to install.   Why not keep the radiant ceiling heat too, as a backup or whatever?    Use ductless for cooling.   Never seen radiant ceiling heat (I have radiant floor), sounds interesting.

Are there ANY scenarios where an LLC would protect you if you self manage? The veil is totally pierced in that case, so why bother paying 2k a year for something that offers no protection? I perform most maintenance and do all management.

The best would be 1) hard wired, 2) 10 year battery backup (so you are not changing every year) 3) talks to you when there are issues eg "co detected" or "fire fire" or at least has a light indicator next to each of those issues.   Isn't helpful when tenant says "detector going off" and you don't have any more info.    

 I haven't yet seen one that is all 3, I don't know why, maybe not enough competition in detector market.    Exception, the Nest, but it is expensive, I only have it in my personal residence.   I use the Kidde (sold at Home Depot) which I will keep using for lack of a better alternative.   Sometimes they fail, most of the time they are fine.   I don't like the BRK (sold at Lowes) because the mounting plate is not good.