All Forum Posts by: Freddy C.

7 forms of passive income, huh? Wonder why 7 (lucky 7?)

Anyway, one interesting "passive" income scheme that was not covered (I believe) is retail utility marketing. Maybe you have seen this, but it is where you get all of your friends, neighbores, etc. to sign up for XYZ Electric Co., and you get a cut every month. And if you recruit another salesman then you also get a piece of their action, etc. :)

I've always wondered about these. I have a friend who got into this but moved away. I still talk to him every once in awhile, I need to see how that is going.

No shame in listening to Dave Ramsey, Tod. To me, Dave's niche is the "financially illiterate/ irresponsible" segment. The people that seek his advice are often in debt up to their eyeballs (consumer debt for ex.), and have no idea how to manage their personal finances. If memory serves, he made a real crummy RE deal once or twice that (contributed) to ruining him. I don't recall the details but he is open about his past (this was many years ago.) Anyway, he wised up and paid his debts down aggressively. Obviously, he is a "cash only" kind of guy now.

That being said, he preaches good advice for the most part. But to answer your question, he is dead wrong on point #4. Leverage, used responsibly, is a great way to grow your business. I disagree wholeheartedly with his "all debt is bad" outlook. "cash only" is his method. He is rigid about this.

From the bad guys...

"Hello,

Good to hear from you. We are happy that you will take good care of our home. The house will be available for three (3) years by then we will be back in the states. We initially wanted to sale the house but we changed our minds and decided to rent it out for now. We might decide to sell in the future but we just want to rent it out for now.

We will be giving the house out at $800/month including utilities (Water Supply, Sewage and Trash Pickup) and a security deposit of $900. The house will be available to move in ASAP. You can go by and view the house and as have said in my previous mail you cannot view the inside because the keys to the house and all other necessary housing document are here with me in London and also there is a sign of Real Estate at the front yard, we had initially given the house to a Real Estate but we later changed our mind, so we deal with our tenant directly in order to save cost since the economy is bad. We have informed them to take off the sign from the house since we are no more dealing with them. So you can ignore it since you are dealing with me directly and I really hope that you will like the house.

Also, the keys are with me, there is nobody of mine that can show you the inside of the house. I hope the pictures I sent to you, can give you the ideal inside of the house. The keys will be sent to you, if you are ready to rent the house and on the condition that the security deposit has been paid. After receiving the keys and you are not okay with the house, your money is refundable, and our keys should not spent upto 5days with you, before posting it back to us, otherwise, we will agree that you are okay with the house.

We would like you to get back to us with the information mail this mail so we can go through it then discuss the rent further."

Well, I’ve had my first taste of a scam being run on my (1st ) rental. Our agent put it on the market in mid-February 2011 and we signed a rental agreement with tenants just last week. Apparently, someone has been and is still posing as me and is listing our property on at least 7 different websites. It is interesting because the bad guys somehow lifted the walk-thru pictures of our property from our legitimate listing on the local MLS. Anyway, the bad guys are posing as me and saying “I†just moved to London w/ my family and “we†did not want to sell the house due to the economy and would like to rent it out for (the ridiculously low price of) $800. Of course, “I†have the keys with me in London, as well as “all the necessary housing document.â€

All someone needs to do is send $900 for the security deposit, and after the money is received the keys to the house will be mailed.

Wow. My realtor forwarded an email chain between the scammer and this poor lady who was interested in the property. She ultimately got wise to what was happening and decided to contact my agent.

My wife googled the property address yesterday and that is how we discovered all the bogus listings. She of course is working with the websites to have all the bogus listings removed.

I guess this is just part of the business, huh? I was wondering if we did something wrong but I guess we were just “lucky†and the bad guys just randomly picked our house.

No, we received the application today and our preliminary due diligence turned-up this red flag. I suppose a call in to the county will clarify this, eh? I put too much credence in the website info being that the time period (5 yrs) was so long. It has to be right, huh? Sarcasm off. Thanks for the heads-up!

I am currently screening tenants right now for the 1st time and we had this family apply today. They own their current home but according to the county website they owe back taxes from 2006?!? Can this be right?? How are they not in debtors prison?? We have not moved forward with any formal credit/background verifications- my wife just did a quick gander of the local county website. Anyway, I am astounded that property taxes can go unpaid for so long. Thanks. ~newb

Appreciate the advice Steve, Jon & Kyle! Thanks.

I refi'd about a year and a half ago, and used that opportunity to get out of escrowing....

I agree that escrowing would be more convenient and perhaps even more cost-effective as one's portfolio grows. I am small potatoes at this point so not escrowing is helpful for me, specifically.

sirck- I looked into getting out of my escrow arrangement with Chase a few years ago and they did not allow it. Not sure if all banks are like this. I do not recall pressing the matter for some reason, so you asked a good question. I do not know why banks do not let you opt in/ out midway into the mortgage. My guess is that is due to the original agreed-upon mortgage covenant where you said you would escrow. Maybe it is that legally they can't and won't waste time with such a request.

I am in the process of renting out my former residence, and I just realized something. While I lived there, I had pretty crummy internet service. We had DSL from Verizon (I believe) and the connection would cut-out intermittently for a few minutes, or longer.

My rental is in a middle-class neighborhood and I would assume most prospective tenants will have a computer and a non dial-up service. So, I can pretty much assume they will experience lousy service as well, right? And further, they will be calling me about it, correct?

I am not tech-savvy, especially when it comes to hardware. Every time we called Verizon to take a look at the issue their solution ultimately did nothing to resolve the problem. Anyone else have to work through an issue like this?