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All Forum Posts by: Shawn H.

Shawn H. has started 5 posts and replied 22 times.

Post: Title Search Tips?

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

In my opinion, you're suggesting doing way too much work prior to knowing if the current owner is interested in selling. My first exercise would be to simply find the name, address, and phone number of the current owner. I'd send my yellow letter from that alone, and I'd call if I could find a good phone number.

The title search is a waste of time until you know you have an interested seller. I'd wait until I had a signed contract to do the title search, and then I'd let a title company / title attorney / closing agent do it. The title companies/attorneys have tools to help them get a complete picture of title. Doing it yourself properly is a huge hassle and you could easily miss something.

I've learned to use professionals and spend my time finding buyers/sellers/investors/properties. This is definitely one of those times where you want a professional when the time is right -- once you have a signed sale contract.

Good luck!

Post: Answering Service / 800 Numbers

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

I love RingCentral. You can have as many REAL phone numbers as you want and you can control routing of those phone numbers to anyone you want. You also have extensions that can be used. Three phone numbers is costing me about $60/mo when all the smoke clears with taxes included, so it's not cheap, but it's cheaper than a live human being and does a lot for me.

I use RingCentral as my one stop shop for Buyers, Sellers, Landlords interested in Property Management, Tenants, and 24 hour recorded information on properties for Sale and available rentals.

The marketing / business cards for each business route people to the correct MAIN phone number within the system and they get appropriate IVR prompts. Buyers, Sellers, and Landlord Owners get to me very quickly. Tire Kickers on yard signs go to 24 hour recorded information where they get the option to get to me at the end of the recording. Prospective and Current Tenants always go to voicemail and I return the call at my convenience.

Phone #1 - Buyers/Sellers & Buy/Sell tire kickers... "If you're calling from a yard sign and know the extension, enter it now. To speak with me, press 1".

Phone #2 - Landlords... routes to me if I'm available. If not, a brief message stating that I will call them back.

Phone #3 - Tenants - VOICEMAIL.

If I go on vacation, I can have these numbers route to the person who is helping me out. If it's 2:30 in the morning and someone tries to call, it goes to voicemail.

I also have a "Soft Phone" on my laptop, so I can make and receive calls anywhere in the world that I have a decent internet connection, even if I'm goofing off in some part of the world where cell phone roaming charges would be outrageous.

Think of the 80/20 rule when you consider the cost of having a tool like this. 20% of the stuff you do makes you money. 80% is the stuff you should not be dealing with personally. This tool helps with some of that 80%.

Post: Evicting A Tenant In the State Of Florida

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

This is an odd situation since you say she is not late yet and she's telling you to "go ahead and evict her". I wonder if she doesn't really understand what she is saying.

Before you can start an eviction process, she needs to be late. If her rent is due on the 1st, she is late on the 2nd provided there's nothing to the contrary in her lease. You then must post a "3 day notice" to pay or give possession.

After the three days has expired (and that's three business days not including court holidays), you can then file a lawsuit for eviction. If you've never done it before, I'd hire an attorney and that will cost you probably $400-500 to get her out provided she doesn't fight the lawsuit. I have had to do several evictions, and I use an attorney every time. If you want to try to do it yourself, there are books out there on it and forms, but if you mess anything up and the tenant responds to the lawsuit, then you could be delayed, or worse, have to pay her attorney's fees.

Given the circumstances, I would have another chat with her and tell her that an eviction will cause her issues with future landlords and that she really doesn't want you to have to do that. Suggest that she move out within a week (or some agreeable time) and you will not be forced to blemish her rental history with an eviction. But, even if you reach an agreement for her to move, serve her with a PROPERLY WRITTEN AND DELIVERED three day notice as soon as she's late. That way if she fails to move in time, you can go straight to the lawsuit and hopefully have her out in 20 days or so.

Good luck!

Post: High utility cost for 3 and 6 plexes

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

Personally, I'd factor in the cost to put each unit on it's own electric and water meter in my offer to purchase. Both of your examples are averaging $122/mo/unit for utilities. I don't know what all is included in that (electric, water, sewer, garbage), but that doesn't sound too bad unless they are tiny units.

Post: Anyone in Florida pay county business Tax Receipts?

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

Pay it if you get caught. Hillsborough County wants Occupational Licenses on all rentals, and they do have occasional enforcement, but their only way of catching you, from what I have found, is through finding a FOR RENT sign on a property that doesn't have an occupational license. It's a real PITA on top of the license fee. If they'd just take your money and leave you alone, that would be bad enough, but they also require a basic property inspection. That means someone has to schedule the inspection and meet them at the property. It's a no brainer inspection, but it's a real time waster on top of the fee they want.

Hillsborough Section 8 office used to be helping Hillsborough by requiring a copy of the Occupational License, but I don't know if they are still doing that because I decided to stop taking new Section 8 tenants about two years ago. My life is now much simpler.

Post: i401k - Credit Union not understanding

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

I have a Sunwest Trust i401k... My bank didn't understand it either, but they just did it. I gave them an EIN number, my SSN as a signer, and they looked up the company name that preceded "401k" and saw that it was a legitimate company... They were happy enough to open the checking account even though they really didn't understand what was going on.

Post: Bank Went into homeowners account and took money

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

I know I am resurrecting an old thread here, but I have a related question...

If the bank is the servicer but not the note holder, does the servicing bank have the right of offset?

Post: Divorce and rental property splits...

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

I was divorced in 2012. My ex took some of the rentals and I kept others as part of our agreement.

These properties have been on a Joint Schedule E through 2011. Now that we are divorced, the plan was for me to continue with "my" properties on Schedule E as if nothing happened (continue depreciation where it left off as well) and her to continue on Schedule E with "her" properties. Is that the correct approach?

Will the IRS automatically recognize that all of the properties are accounted for between our two separate single tax returns for 2012?

Would they automatically recognize if all of them were not accounted for (ie: she forgot to file her Schedule E forms, which is possible unfortunately - I'm trying to coach her on what she needs to do)?

Anything special I should do to cover myself? I'm not planning to put her properties on my tax return. And, they are profitable - not generating paper losses.

Post: IRS TIN Matching Program grief from local HUD office

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5

I'm getting some grief from the local Housing Office due to their failure to understand complex real estate title holding strategies and the IRS TIN Matching program.

1) The Housing Office wants to know who the owner of a property is by supplying a copy of the deed.
2) They want to match the SSN/EIN of the owner for 1099 purposes using the IRS TIN matching service.

Easy, right? Well, not so easy if you are holding title in trust and the trustee is different from the beneficiary.

The "owner" is just holding title and they are not receiving the benefit of the property and obviously don't want a 1099 at the end of the year for gross rents on a property they do not enjoy the financial benefits of.

The "beneficiary" EIN number is a different entity altogether but is the person/entity that should be getting the 1099.

We supply the EIN of the beneficiary, the housing office does TIN matching against the "owner trustee", and it doesn't match. They throw it back at us.

And the housing office will withhold rent if they get too frustrated, so I have to fix this in a way that they will understand -- or just not rent to Section 8 tenants, which isn't a bad option either.

Anyone else run into this and how did you get through their thick skulls?

Thanks!

Post: No Money Down Strategies

Shawn H.Posted
  • Involved In Real Estate
  • St. Petersburg, FL, FL
  • Posts 22
  • Votes 5
just posted a snippet of what I'm trying to setup, here is the jist:
I find an investor, usually a friend or family.
This is for buy and hold, with potential appreciation.
They put down 100% of the purchase price and closing costs.
They get 50% of rent off the top.
The remaining 50% goes to me and I am responsible for all expenses.
Upon a sale, the investor gets his investment back first. I get back any repair/improvement costs, and the rest is 50/50.
Of course, according to the 50% rule, I would not make any money per month and only on the sale assuming appreciation; but if there is a vacancy, the investor doesnt get anything, so we split that risk.

I would appreciate any comments or criticisms about this model. I think it sounds really good for both sides of the table.

If you're only looking for appreciation in exchange for all your hard work and the risk of running over on expenses, then this would work in an appreciating market. It's a great deal for the money guy.

I might try to negotiate the deal a little different. Something like this maybe:
- Expenses are paid first.
- They get the next 30% based on gross rent
- You get the next 10% based on gross rent
- You split the remainder if any is left.

This would almost guarantee that you get some money each month in exchange for your work unless there was a bad month in expenses.

How are you negotiating capital improvements that may be needed during the course of the JV? If the house needs A/C or a roof you could get killed if this hasn't been addressed separately from standard maintenance type expenses.

Anyone else have some thoughts on this? I'd like to brainstorm this type of scenario a little more for my own purposes...