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All Forum Posts by: Tyson S.

Tyson S. has started 6 posts and replied 44 times.

That's going to be tough for premiums as it takes a ton of factors into account.  I use 0.6% of replacement value for my annual premium estimates on SFHs and it hasn't burned me yet.  No idea on multi-families although I know conversions are insane to insure.

Post: Tenant subtly damaging property?

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

Thanks for the suggestions everyone, very good points.

@Dustin Heiner Requesting the contractor to take before and after photos is an excellent idea. I think the contractor themselves are a bit weary of this tenant and being accused of doing damage so it would be beneficial to both of us.

We do have provisions to do inspections but haven't been good at doing them.

@Marcia Maynard I've owned it a little more than 5 years now.  The screening went well.  They had a fairy long rental history with good references and good income. They may be trying to test the waters with me at this point. I have said no to other requests so far and they have pretty much dropped the request so I think I will begin to take a harder stance on some of these issues.

We did a move-in condition report and the tenant actually reported no existing problems.  The tricky part is determining what has been damaged by the tenant and what has stopped working since they've moved in.

Post: Tenant subtly damaging property?

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

Summary if you don't want to read the whole post: Tenant thinks they will be able to buy the house they are in from me and may be intentionally damaging property to get free repairs prior to buying the house. Don't have any concrete proof but am unsure of how to proceed.

I have a delicate situation that hasn't turned badly yet but is setting off warning signals and was hoping to get some advice.

A fairly new tenant has been submitting numerous repair requests.  The first few seemed quite legitimate as I personally went to check them out and even repaired some of the smaller issues.  Some larger issues cropped up that I wasn't able to deal with so I called a contractor I was familiar with.  This is when some of the dubious repair requests started coming in and now the contractor has passed on comments made to him by the tenant that are worrisome.

There was some sagging subfloor that needed to be replaced from water damage prior to my ownership.  During the repair of the subfloor, the tenant made multiple comments to the contractor about needing new carpet in the bedroom (it's about 5 years old).  Has not made this comment to me yet.  After these comments had been made, the tenant claimed there were rips and tears in the carpet resulting from the repair of the floor.  The contractor had mentioned to me they noticed damage in areas they weren't working in.  The repair was in one area of the bedroom and the carpet damage appeared in the other side.

The tenant also mentioned to the contractor multiple times that they were going to buy the house from me.  I've never had any discussion about the house being available for sale.

The comments about needing new carpet and buying the house makes me worried that the tenant is intentionally sabotaging the property to get "free" repairs in the hopes that they will eventually own the home.

How would you proceed at this point? I don't have any concrete proof as it's a bit of a he said, she said thing with the contractor and tenant but I have a good relationship with this contractor and carpet damage seems like a petty thing to deny damaging.  In fact, they damaged some wiring during the floor repair and fixed it, no questions asked, but balked at the carpet damage.

Thanks in advance.

Post: Difficult finding investment property in Des Moines, IA

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

I've looked off and on at flipping MLS foreclosures in the area for several years. I have yet to find one that I'm comfortable with after running the numbers. I completely understand what you mean by the 5-10k profit, that's all I ever come out with when running numbers too. Seems like a lot of the guys flipping have their own crew or are doing their own work, full time work basically, which I can't compete with. I've had more success finding houses for rentals.

Post: Partial driveway repair

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

Thanks for the insight Dave NA

Post: Partial driveway repair

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

I need to replace about 1/3 of a driveway at my rental because it's heaved and directs water into the garage rather than away from it. I can't really decide how to deduct this, is it a repair or capital expendure? It's a driveway repair but it's also a partial replacement so I could see it going both ways.

Post: Cash-out refinances

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

I would agree with what Luis said, I couldn't find anyone to do it until I had 12 months of seasoning though. After I hit 12 months I had no problems finding a myriad of lenders. I ended up getting a 3.625% rate with 0.25% points and 75% LTV at a local bank. It wasn't a cash purchase originally but I was at about 60% LTV after I made repairs. Cashed out to 75% and I reduced my interest rate so much that I ended up with a lower monthly payment after cashing out.

This was only my second loan though. Have no experience with 5-10 so my experience may not apply to you.

Post: Rental Property & Lead Paint

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

I own a pre 78 property. Prior to getting the rental certificate I had to have all horizontal surfaces tested for lead paint. Sounds bad but it amounted to just the window sills and was about $175. No problems and got the certificate. Now on the other side, I recently had to back out of a deal because there was lead paint on both the interior and exterior of the house. The extra costs to safely remove all of it made margins too thin. Most of the cost was in the exterior siding removal.. It does remind me a lot of asbestos requirements.

Post: Competition

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

I've been watching and putting offers on REOs for about 8 months now in my market and have gotten exactly 1 deal done. I don't think we have institutional competition here but there is plenty of other competition and the good deals are nearly non-existent, especially rehabbing. Need to take a good look at my strategies and probably switch something up.

Post: Estimating Cash flow

Tyson S.Posted
  • Investor
  • Des Moines, IA
  • Posts 45
  • Votes 13

I use craigslist and rentometer. Just make sure you are in the same neighborhood and same amount of bedrooms. One block can make a huge difference in rents where I am. Make small adjustments for amenities or extra square footage or lack of.

I just search craigslist for different ranges of rents until I find both the neighborhood and size of property I am renting. I keep raising the search range by $50 or $100 until I stop seeing the houses in the neighborhood. Gives you an idea of the min/max of the market.