All Forum Posts by: Stacy Weng

@Account Closed Send you a PM.

@Joseph Scorese Sent you a PM!

@Diane S. The PM company was supposed to take care of the license application process for me, but they haven't even submitted the applications to the courthouse yet! When we originally spoke, he said he can get the application submitted within a week, and it's been over 2 months. Every time I call, it's either "on the calendar" or there's been a delay. 

@Chris K. Funny that you mention referrals. After contacting a number of PM firms without success, I met someone here at BP who referred me to a PM firm. Turns out, it was one of the companies I'd already spoken to. The contact at the company I was given from the referral was different from whom I'd already spoken to there, so I was hoping they'd be more responsive. But when I reached out, that person referred me back to the original person that I had already spoken to, and that person never responded back! So you can see my frustration here.... =/

@Chris K. Thanks for the rec. I've spoken to Joe White briefly before, I'll reach out to him again if this PM company continues to be unresponsive.

I realize that PM companies have more incentive to focus on customers with a larger portfolio with them, I'd do the same. But if they're not interested in working with a small time investor, they should just be upfront about it and say so instead of wasting their time. I've had some PM companies tell me it's not worth it for them, and I appreciated their honesty. 

And who's to say an investor that starts out with one property won't grow to have a larger portfolio over time? You'd think they'd want to build that relationship, unless demand is just that high that they can afford to not give a crap about customer service.

Anyways, just my 2 cents!  

Hi BP,

I'm looking for recommendations for a Property Management firm that services the City of Philadelphia that has experience with problem properties. I'm from out of state and took over a problem property from a family member in hopes of straightening things out. 

I've found it especially difficult to find good, responsive PM's in Philadelphia for some reason. I tried reaching out to a bunch of highly rated PM companies, and even the ones that I've had good initial conversations with, are horrible at responding back to get to those next steps.

I finally had a great convo with the owner of a PM firm that sounded like they knew what they were doing and were willing to help. Their references checked out too. The first thing I needed to do to get everything in the right order with the property was to get all the proper licenses. I was going to do this myself since it seemed like everything could be done online. However, this PM company said it might be easier for them to do it, since they go to the courthouse regularly anyway, and it'll help avoid any mistakes I might make on my own. I was more than happy to let them handle it and sent in all the license applications and payment. This was over 2 months ago. I've since tried emailing and calling numerous times, and it's been extremely difficult getting a response. The times when I've been able to get someone on the phone, I've been told it's on the calendar to get it done, but it keeps getting delayed.

I'm now considering just telling them to forget about everything and find another PM company to work with. But I also want to avoid having the same thing happen again and waste even more time on this.

I'd really appreciate any recommendations on reputable and reliable PM firms with experience working with problem properties.

Thanks!

Stacy

@Teresa Szafranowicz I'm in the process of working on my first property with ABC in Baltimore, which I purchased about two months ago. The property isn't complete yet, so I can't speak to the entire experience, but I can provide some initial feedback on my experience with them so far. The sales rep I've been working with, Ari, has been great. He's super responsive and always gets back to me in a timely manner whenever I have questions or concerns. And you can tell that they have the investors' best interests in mind. 

However, there have been some miscommunication along the way that have led to some frustrations. When I purchased my property, I was told that the rehab would start right away. A month later, when I wanted to schedule some time to see the property and check on its progress, I was told that they found a squatter in there, so they had to file a writ with the city to get the squatter out, which could take a month, meaning the rehab won't even start until 2 months in. And even though I was reassured that things like this happen, and that the rental guarantee would protect me from the delays, it was really disappointing to hear. The whole thing still didn't sit well with me b/c I didn't have a clear understanding of what was going on. I thought the rehab would've long started by then, so how come they didn't discover the squatter until a whole month later?

When I talked to Jay, he explained that they typically don't start the rehab right away, since they're working with a lot of properties and need to schedule and allocate the resources accordingly, which I totally understand. I think if the right info were communicated to the investors in the beginning to help properly manage their expectations, the process would be a lot smoother for everyone. But like Jay said, they're working on improving the communication part of their business, so it's a work in progress.

I'm hoping the squatter issue will get resolved very soon, so I can finally schedule some time to go see the property within the next few weeks. Will keep you posted on how everything goes!

@Paulette Midgette, thanks! Also sent you a PM.

@Paulette Midgette Thank you, this is all super helpful info! Unfortunately, I guess my FIL left a much bigger mess for us to clean up than we ever thought. =/  Regarding the oral lease, how would that hold up in court during an eviction process if there isn't any sort of documentation? And say best case scenario, the tenant moved out, can the City of Philadelphia still make you return rent collected if there wasn't a license in place before? How do they determine the rent amount if there's no written lease in place?

And for the lien search, is http://epay.phila-records.com/phillyepay/web/ the correct site to find this type of info? It looks like you have to pay, so I just want to make sure it's the right site before moving forward. Although I've heard that it can be hard to find all the lien info on the public site, so would it make more sense to just pay for a lien/judgement search?

Sorry for all the questions, just want to make sure I understand everything so I can get this sorted out the proper way!

Thanks!

Thanks @Joe White, that's what I thought made most sense too! 

@Steve Babiak sent you a PM!