All Forum Posts by: Stephen Zygiel

 Karen, I know a good mortgage broker who may be able to help. I'll send you a PM with his info.

 Illinois is a designated agency state. So, the fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of your client should be sufficient incentive to get the deal done.

@Michael Mastantuono , in a fiduciary state, an agent not working directly contracted with you owes you very little outside of not directly lying to you and informing you of material defects. If you lack experience or are concerned about the process, seek your own council. 

We have landlord policy covering wind, tornados, and rebuild. None of our rentals are in a 100 year flood zone. There is an umbrella covering overages on all of them.

The utility company replaced a meter on one of my rentals one time. Tenant didn't have a pool, so the huge spike raised an eyebrow. The utility company forgot to reset the meter after they had refurbished it. They entered it in at 00000 gallons while the meter itself still read a little over 1,000. When the automated reader pushed the numbers, the bill was ridiculous. A quick call the the utility company sorted it out very fast. Maybe check that out?

I bought my first house from a friend. With the transaction being a little less than arms-length, I was more lenient (and trusting) in issues that I would have been otherwise. Not having an agent to represent me in a transaction type I had never been through before meant I realized my blind spots after signing instead of before. Luckily my home inspector was very good. While I did get a reasonable deal, I have had to put a bit of work into it to really shore up a few of the issues with it.

Investment Info:

Other buy & hold investment in Owasso.

Purchase price: $234,000
Cash invested: $23,400

House hack. With favorable market rates. We bought a home with a large upstairs we don't really use. Rented the space out to some people we know. We hardly ever see them, and they cover more than half the note.

What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

Bigger Pockets podcasts subliminally made my wife more receptive to the option.

How did you find this deal and how did you negotiate it?

My wife had a room mate prior to our getting married. Her room mate didn't want to rent out my wife's old house. We were buying a house large enough to expand into having kids. During one of the showings, I told my wife to bring the room mate along to see if she liked the upstairs area.

How did you finance this deal?

Mortgage broker with really favorable terms.

What was the outcome?

The room mate pays about 3/5ths of our note.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

Remember to be open to utilize the resources available to you and look at those resources through other peoples eyes. I would not be OK renting out a room from someone at this point in my life, but my perspective is not theirs.

Did you work with any real estate professionals (agents, lenders, etc.) that you'd recommend to others?

I am a real estate agent.