All Forum Posts by: Toni Annis

@Jacob Laird and @Michele Fischer thank you both for your insights and recommendations. I did reach out to the tenant and asked that we meet and see if we could work something out. He actually told me that he was planning to let me know when he paid March's rent that he would be moving out the end of the month. He tried starting his own business last summer and it has been a rough start. He has been struggling to pay the rent and his pickup payments etc. so he has decided to move back in with his parents until he can get his pickup caught up and the business going strong enough to support him.

I really appreciate both of your input and I'm very glad that I followed your recommendations and talked to him. I feel like we are ending the lease on good terms for both of us. Whereas if I had just issued notices of violations and fees it could have resulted in bad feelings. He was so grateful that we reached out and actually cared that he promised that he would have the carpets cleaned and the house completely move in ready before turning the keys to me. Whether he does or not doesn't really matter, but at least he isn't likely to trash the house or leave a complete mess because he is upset. For that I am very thankful!

I love having this community to help guide me and help me grow so that I can become a better person and landlord!

I have a tenant that has been in place since April 2018. After his year lease was up his lease agreement switched to a month to month lease. Up until very recently he has been an excellent tenant. I never had to worry about late rent, he was very communicative, fixed things around the house when issues arose, and was always very respectful. A few months ago however I started to notice a change in him. He was late on rent a couple of times but messaged me in advance to let me know he would be and paid his late fee. Then a couple of months ago my water bill on the property sky rocketed. He assured me he checked everywhere and could find no leaks or any reason for the excessive water bill. Then I called the city to see if there was a meter issue (it's happened before with this property) but they couldn't find anything. I finally called a plumber who said that my tenant had actually called them to the property a few months back and stiffed them on a repair bill. The plumber thought my tenant was the owner of the property and had no idea it was a rental. They did go back to the property for me and discovered that the hose to the tenants swamp cooler was left running and water was going everywhere. They wound up disconnecting the swamp cooler hose so that this couldn't happen again. Then the month before last I got notice that the natural gas company was switching the gas bill over to us because the tenant isn't paying the bill. I immediately got in touch with the tenant, he took care of the gas bill and got the account switched back over to his name. Now yesterday I just got notice that is has happened again. I messaged the tenant about the issue but he is now not responding to me. According to the lease agreement I know that I could in fact charge my tenant for the last couple of months of excessive water bills. Although I'm not even sure it's worth the hassle. Obviously there are some money issues going on and he probably doesn't have the money to pay for it. On the gas bill I'm thinking I need to issue him a lease violation notice. I'm beginning to wonder if I should continue with his lease or if I should consider issuing a notice of lease non-renewal and look for a new tenant. Thought I would post in here and see if any more seasoned landlords could offer me some advice or insight. Thank you all!

@Clinton Ide

Hi Clinton!!! So glad to see another investor in Casper. I would love to get together sometime! Sorry it took me a while to get back to you. I've been pretty quiet on the investing front lately as I've been focusing my energy into our other business. Are you by chance related to Bob and Cathy?

I was wondering if anyone has had any luck getting a single wide mobile home to qualify for a conventional mortgage and if so what lender you found that would do it. I currently have an older mobile home that I am using as a rental. I know that I am looking at needing some pretty major repairs (new roof & windows) in the near future that are going to be large out of pocket expenses that won't actually increase the properties value at all. With interest rates so low right now I would really love to take advantage and just replace the house. I wish I could do a double wide but unfortunately the lot is too narrow to allow it. I have a quote from a local mobile home dealer that to get a new 3/2 single wide installed on a engineered pier foundation (the same foundation they use to get a double wide to qualify for conventional mortgages) would run me around $84,000. With this type of home I could increase my rents by $300/mo and I know that if I put the property on the market for sale it would list for around $130,000 not to mention it would significantly increase my buyer pool. Anyone know how I might be able to make this happen? So far the banks I talked to will only do a personal loan at high interest out to around 20 years which would put my payments higher than my rent would be.

@Nick Hamar Welcome! I too have heard very good things about Alisha Collins although I haven't used her yet. Stay away from Michelle Trost Hall! We used them for our first investment property simply because they were the ones who had the property listed. Big mistake. They kept calling our bank trying to get them to tack on a bunch of fees to our loan and saying I knew about said fees. My bank of course called me before doing so and I raised hell and got the fees taken off. Will not do business with them again! If they have a property I am interested in I will use a buyer's agent and be on top of their rediculous fees from the get go.

Does anyone else have problems with the BP Mobile App? I love having the info at my finger tips but I struggle with being able to tag people in conversations, write comments, or message other members. I cannot tag anyone when having a conversation on the mobile app. When I try to type a comment everything gets jumbled up and I cannot get things to type out right. If I try to send another member a message it deletes my last word when I add a space and only keeps a random word once in a while. I thought it was my phone but I got a new phone and am having the exact same problems. Does anyone know of a fix for this?

I'm in Alcova. Not far from Casper. Would love to do a meet-up if we could possibly get away. It is difficult with two small kids and business to keep running. Would love to stay in the loop and try like heck to make it though!

Will have to see what we have going on that day.

Will have to see what we have going on that day.

Welcome fellow Casperite! It's always nice to find someone close to home!