All Forum Posts by: Patrick L.

First, never let a tenant move in without the full move in amount. If they don't have the entire deposit they're probably not going to turn out to be great tenants.

As for repairs, here in Florida all I have to do is provide 24 hours notice that I will be entering the property. If I can't get a hold of the tenant I'll post the notice on their door stating a date and time that I/my maintenance staff will be entering. If you have keys they don't need to be there.

If you have self employment income, a good CPA will save you more in taxes than you pay for his/her fee. There's no reason to be using H&R Block/Turbo Tax.

A lot of agents will not take you seriously if you haven't seen the property....unless you're willing to waive your inspection. So many people put in blind offers on these short sales and then use their inspection period to decide if they actually want it or not. It's a huge waste of time for everyone involved. I buy a lot of houses and when I see a short sale pop up that I'm interested in then I'm usually at the property in under an hour and if I'm interested then the listing agent has a contract from me in under 2 hours from the time it's listed with assurances I've been to the property and will close on it. That's how I've gotten some of my best deals on short sales and often they've turned away higher offers from people that hadn't been to the property.

If you're talking about a really big infestation you're going to have to remove all of the insulation and probably replace the sheetrock on all of the ceilings in the areas where the bats were. You also may need to paint all of the wood in the attic with something to kill the smell.

The biggest problem I run into here with multi family, especially distressed ones, is that the city requires a business license for any multi family properties. If that license has lapsed or was never applied for they are no longer legal units and it's a 2-3 month process to get them reinstated (if the city allows them).....the process here involves a property card interpretation by the city to see if they were legal to begin with and an inspection by the building dept to make sure they meet current code. That's the law here in St Petersburg, FL......in your city it's going to be different but that's always my biggest problem with multi family.

Parking is always an issue too, I have a 5 unit building where the tenants are always fighting about parking and blocking each other in.

If your offer is less than the total payoff then it's going to be up to the bank, and will probably be months for a response one way or another. If it's really worth a lot more than the offer, then the bank generally will not approve it. It will depend on what the BPO comes back at. Don't assume that just because a property is in foreclosure that it's going to sell for half of what it's worth.

If the house sells for more than what he owes on the mortgage then it's no longer a short sale. A short sale is when the bank agrees to take less than what is owed on the mortgage. As long as the purchase price covers all of the principal, back interest, late fees, attorney's fees, escrow shortages, etc then the bank isn't even involved. If that's the case then all you have to do is make him an offer and have him sign off on it.....if the mortgage is covered then that's all there is to it.

Sink holes are not as common as most people think in FL. There has been a lot of insurance fraud for settlement issues that people claimed as sink holes which really drove the insurance market out of whack. Most sinkholes in the state will be in Pasco, eastern/northern Hillsborough, and Hernando counties which are all in the same area. The very northern part of Pinellas county would also be part of that area too.

Most of the issue isn't a naturally occurring problem, it's a man made problem from pumping too much ground water out of the aquifers, mostly by farmers. Houses aren't getting swallowed up left and right, despite what the cable news networks might like you to believe.

Absolutely. With that much traffic whoever gets it is definitely overpaying. If you have experience with rehabs look for something more distressed that will weed out a lot of buyers, especially if you have cash. Something with a tarp on the roof, boarded up windows, something some kids broke into and had a party and messed up, etc.

When tenants ask I tell them approximately how many I have. A lot of them deal with amateur landlords that don't have the means to fix things when they break, are in foreclosure, take forever to fix things on a service call, etc. Number of rentals doesn't necessary mean you're telling them what you make....you could have big loans on them or own them all free and clear. I want my tenants to know that I know what I'm doing. I tell them if they pay their rent on time we will always take care of any issues with the property in a timely manner, and if they don't pay their rent they will be removed from the property in a timely manner as well.