All Forum Posts by: Stan Hill

@Ron K. 

At the risk of sounding pessimistic, I believe feel-good government policies will hit the lower wage workers the worse. They will become increasingly poor as time goes on and lower end rentals will be a good place to invest.

@Valerie Young  Valerie thanks for posting on this issue. I am also interested in a few 4-plexes. If you see only one, it seems to me you have to presume you've seen the best one. I would suggest assuming the others aren't looking nearly as nice as the one you've seen. Please let us know how this works out and good luck!

I'm not a big fan of 3/1s- more difficult to get rented out. 

@David Stott  Wow. I think these guys could have saved themselves some hassle by simply not mentioning it. 

As I understand it, a property has to be Section 8 approved. If someone then asked if they could move in on Section 8 assistance, I would simply tell them I am sorry but this property is not approved for Section 8.

Someone please tell me if I am getting this wrong.

@Tina Caroll

To each his own but I wouldn't do it. I'm a bit of a softy, though. For example, I have an elderly couple as tenants in a house. We bought the house in April. The wife seems to be running the show. She has not returned the signed rental agreement since we took over. Last month, she had heart surgery and was off work for a few weeks. She sent her rent $100 short. I let it slide. I would rather be overaccomodating to and elderly couple. For me, it's a karma thing.

@Jack Slattery

We have a self-directed IRA structured as an LLC. We have been told time and time again by the people who set it up for us we do not have to file a tax return. We will pay income tax when distributions are taken.

No. My biggest fear: no matter what safety measures you take, if a renter's kid or neighbor kid drowns, somehow it will be your fault. I have never had a pool, but also suspect maintenance would be an issue.

Maybe I am a bit conservative, but I am not sure selling land to buy a new car for cash shows wisdom in handling one's finances. On the one hand, it's awesome it's paid for. But a brand new Dodge Durango? Eh, I'm probably being too tough on the guy.

Hi Robert: Interesting situation. I am no lawyer, but here is my 2 cents'- and may be overvalued. If they didn't claim this was a service dog from the start, and you can document the back and forth negotiating the rent with no mention of this along the way, it seems to me a reasonable judge will see right through this charade. That said, I have gotten unpleasant surprises from JPs in the past- two to be exact. In both cases, I felt the JP acted as a negotiator rather than act on principle. Both cases were in front of the same JP, so I have no idea if this is commonplace or not.

I would love to see how this turns out. If decided on the basis of right on wrong, it appears you have a slam dunk. However, pulling out the emotional cards from the deck can be quite effective.

 Brandon: using Collin County as an example, I would go to collincad.org and do a address property search on the specific property you are looking at. It should tell you line-by-line the taxes and exemptions of a given property. It will list things like over 65 and Homestead. If you see a $15,000 deduction from the appraised value on the Homestead line, then you know they are getting the exemption. You have to just follow the math, it doesn't explicitly say which exemptions the owner is claiming- I'm pretty sure, anyway.