All Forum Posts by: Patrick L.

Dewey Mitchell Those are nice cages, more high end than the ones I buy. My thought on AC cages is still people can get through them if they really need to steal your copper....if they bring a cut off tool they can get through pretty much anything. It's just a matter of what else they can steal elsewhere and how hard yours is vs the payout.

Ohio may be the king of metal theft but Florida is the king of way too long foreclosures with tons of houses sitting vacant for 3-5 years that people walked away from as soon the the foreclosure was filed. There are plenty of targets. Plus in Florida you can pretty much just shoot anybody you want so it's a bad idea to be trying to steal them from a house you think might be occupied.

Well he does most my A/C work too....he had 8 system installs and all my service work last year. He makes a few bucks on the cages, if I didn't have him do all the other work I'm sure he'd charge me more to build the cages.

It's not rebar but it's also not the ticker tubular steel you see on the expensive prefab ones. They're made from smooth round solid steel bars. An A/C cage is just a deterrent in my mind. If somebody absolutely wants to steal your unit you aren't going to stop them, but it's an opportunity crime so if it makes it 10x harder then they're going to move on. I have about 20 of the cages out there and haven't lost a unit with one of my cages yet.

I don't have a picture but I'll grab one in the next couple days when I'm out doing rent collections.

My AC guy builds and installs them for me for $85 (because I give him a ton of AC work). He enjoys welding so he just custom builds them in his free time out of steel, his cost is pretty minimal.

Doesn't even look like a house to me....just a trailer. It's been on the market in the mid to low 200's for about a year, what makes you think an investor is going to see that as a great opportunity to turn it for a profit? Probably overpriced for what it is.

The biggest problem with this for Mike's situation is they will not negotiate or promise you anything until after the violations are fully corrected.

If it's lot clearing or utility liens those are straight forward and the banks will pay those. What he's referring to are the fines that the local governments place on properties for violating city codes. It could be an illegal addition or it could be peeling paint on a hand rail....often it's the same fine. I've seen properties with tabs running of more than $1,000/day for rotted wood that hasn't been fixed. There are properties in this area with $5M+ in code enforcement liens because the property has been sitting vacant and nobody has fixed what the government wanted fixed so now it's become a permanently unmarketable property falling into further disrepair.

Here's an article about Pinellas County code liens...it's from a year ago so most of those properties have tacked on another half million in liens.

http://www.tampabay.com/news/localgovernment/scofflaws-code-violation-fines-top-their-pinellas-county-homes-value/1225207

Mike Nelson From my experience around here they will not promise you anything. Until the violation is corrected there's really no way to appeal it. I've dealt with banks that have delayed closing so they could fix stupid little issues that have large fines and then go in front of a magistrate to get them reduced and they've usually had luck......but there's no way I'd buy a property with a $100k lien with the assumption I could make it go away (unless I can buy it for $100k below market value).

Jon Holdman Often when a bank has code violations that they have no desire to clear they will ask the buyer to sign a hold harmless on any and all code enforcement issues. I've walked away from several deals because of that.

Mike Nelson You should call the code enforcement office and see what their take is on it. I know the City of St Petersburg has a program where you can apply when you get the property under contract for a code amnesty program which will involve you clearing up all the violations that led to the fines and getting the property reinspected within 30 days. I've had 0 luck with Pinellas County Code Enforcement having any willingness to work with me on properties that have fines, they just tell me until the issue is cleared the fines will continue.....even if it changes ownership they wouldn't give me a grace period to correct them. Most places around here if you want to try to get them reduced you have to fix the issue and then take it to a special magistrate to appeal the fines....and there's no guarantee of what will happen.

Talk to a commercial insurance agent, I have most of my rentals under two commercial policies. One covers only liability and the other property damage. You'll need an agent to get coverage from most of the carriers that handle this type of risk, they aren't usually direct to consumer. I think I pay like a little over $2k a year for nearly 30 rental units on a policy with $1M/$2M in liability coverage.