All Forum Posts by: Todd Witt

@Mike O'Connor The "no illegal dumping" signs are a good idea. I have a feeling some of ours are coming from the complex across the street too. Some of it is our tenants though because I recognize the couch. For now, I think I am going to send out a letter to everyone reminding them that what doesn't fit in the dumpster will not be picked up and that it is their responsibility to properly dispose of it. If I know whose stuff it is and am also going to start invoicing them for my time/landfill bill.

We are resistant to cameras too, but that may be where we are headed. Even if we never take the time to review them, just their presence may help out. Who knows.

Thank you for taking the time to give an update on your experience.

Todd

Welcome to the forums @Olivier Nallet!

@Mike O'Connor I'm curious if you ever found an effective way to fix this issue. We are having similar issues recently at an 18-unit with tenants leaving couches or mattresses next to the dumpsters and trash in the laundry rooms.

Thanks for sharing. I am going to have to give Valspar cabinet enamel a shot. We have tried a few other paints a try with cabinets and I have never been happy with the finished feel and sometimes yellowing of the top coats they required. The cabinets always felt like someone had painted them when we were done.

Don't forget to ask for any walk through or move-in inspection documents so you have documentation of the property prior to the tenant moving in. Otherwise you may end up returning the entire security deposit if the tenant claims all damages were "like that when I moved in" and you have no evidence to disprove them.

If the previous owner did not keep move-in inspection documents, you can perform your own walk through inspection when you get the property to in case there are damages between then and move-out.

Welcome to the forums @Aaron Gould! House hacking is how I started too. It is a great way to build savings fast. Get ready, once the cash flow starts coming in the itch grows fast!

Welcome to the forums @Punit Dhakan! A great first place to start is by listening to the BP podcast during your commute or lunch break. Don't worry about the titles or subjects of the podcast, just keep listening. After a month or so you will have a better idea of what type of investing peaks your interest and you will have been exposed to a ton of great resources (books, websites, bloggers, etc.) where you can dive deeper into specific topics.

Bump up the playback to play at 1.2-1.5x to speed up the learning a little bit.

In my town sellers usually ask for 8-10% depending on the property class. A well maintained B class property can get 8%.

This is sounding very familiar to a situation we had with inherited tenants this past winter. In our situation, she was on the lease while her boyfriend was living in the apt without a lease. When she called us to ask out of her lease to escape domestic abuse, I let her know we would let her out immediately and we would start the eviction process on him. About a month later they both left the apartment (destroyed) and I got a call from another landlord in town who was screening their application for another place together.

Looking back I don't know if I would have done anything different. 

From a moral point of view I am glad we gave her every option to escape the situation that we could (which it sounds like you are willing to do as well). 

From a property owner point of view, there was alot of damage to the walls and windows clearly from thrown objects so removing the tenants from our property as soon as possible minimized the cost of repairs. 

I agree with Robert, there are laws protecting victims of domestic abuse. Even if there isn't a restraining order, if there are police records or other evidence documenting domestic issues I would let her out of the lease. At the same time I would look at the lease you have with the abuser and see if there is a clause to terminate his lease for "criminal acts on the property". Not a tenant you wanna keep around.