All Forum Posts by: Account Closed

On one point in your post - I would not try and recoup late fees that you didn't charge at the time. That's water under the bridge.

As everyone else says, give them notice, let this lease end. Get in there and spruce it up a little and rent it out at market rate. You could move it over to a property manager but you seem to have some experience and are doing well on your other rental so that would be up to you in the end if you feel you need it and don't mind doing the job.

@Rose Stuart

If you stop beating yourself up about it for a second, you'll realize that while you made some mistakes (a) you got your MBA in real estate investing and you're unlikely to make the same mistakes again and (b) you are not the first BP member to make some mistakes.

Now that you're fully rented, can you hang in there for a while? Pay off some of those credit cards that I'm sure were used on the above projects. Take your time and let the steady income soothe your pride?

Hopefully you can. If the situation is more dire than that... well, we'll wait for the second part of your story.

@Jean Bolger

I'm thinking the same thing. I'm waiting for a family member to drive by later today and let me know what they see when they do a drive by later today. The story has died down (at least until the court case begins in a few months, I guess) and I can't imagine there are 50 journalists outside the front gate. What she witnessed is so minor I doubt there will be that much ongoing interest in her part of the story. Essentially she saw two of the perpetrators walking down her street talking some time before the murder happened.

The more I think about it, I don't think the situation is that bad and she is just shaken. I'm being as sympathetic as possible. If it helps, I'll give her my big, burly brother-in-law's number in case she needs anyone to stop by.

@Marcia Maynard

The neighborhood is safe, the crime committed was a "domestic" crime (a husband figured that hiring a hit man was more effective than divorcing his wife since he'd have to give her half of all their assets... no prenup) and not a case of unknown thugs coming into the neighborhood. The perpetrators were caught pretty quickly and all three are in jail and are being held without bail. So nothing to fear from the criminals themselves.

I'm going to have my brother-in-law drive by (he lives a few minutes away) to check how bad it is (i.e. how many journalists are camped outside her house). The property has pretty high walls around so I don't think the journalists can see in but I think she is just older and feels shaken and vulnerable.

The tenant has actually specified that she wants to move out end of August. Which leads me to believe its not as bad as she might think it is right now and maybe in a few weeks, things may blow over.

Lesson of the day... don't get married without a prenup. It may not be considered "romantic" but it can avoid a lot of confusion later on...

Just to prove that there is no "normal" day at the office when you deal with tenants, I had an interesting case today.

So a high profile crime ocurred some months back in the neighborhood of one of my rentals. Its been covered extensively in the local press. At least part of the crime therefore happened right across the road from my rental unit.

My tenants' (a lovely older couple) lease is expiring at the end of July and my property manager emailed them to ask if they were staying. The wife comes into the office of my property manager this morning in tears. She and her husband want to stay long term she but she is fearful of her safety and says they will be moving out. She witnessed some part of the crime and is now considered a witness in the court case. Now she has the press permanently camped outside her house and they are hounding her every day. Her husband is a trucker and is gone mostly during the week so she is having to face this on her own and is afraid to even walk out her house because they swamp her and try to get an interview with her.

I feel so bad for her. She is so nice (she spends hours in the garden which looks like a postcard, and they take care of my rental as if it were their own home). The poor dear.

I have another unit vacant (tenant ended her lease and moved out yesterday) that may work for them but unfortunately it doesn't have a garden, only a balcony.

Just goes to show, anything can happen.

@Carolyn Fuller

Understood. That makes sense.

@Carolyn Fuller

I think I understood that you plan to rent the apartment sight-unseen to the intended applicant? Its always best to at least meet the person and that they have viewed the apartment prior to renting. Pictures don't always do a place justice and a foreigner may just have different expectations about the meaning of words. For example, the words "fully furnished" and "spacious" have very different meanings in different countries. I would suggest that you simply wait until they arrive and then show the apartment and make arrangements for the transfer of funds once you fully screen the applicant and everyone has signed a lease.

One thing you can do is work with the local university that may refer students to you once they arrive especially if they have an international students office.

Sending you a shout out from Queens. Welcome!

@Joshua Diaz

 Send a colleague request to @Darren Sager

who can make sure you are included in future invites for a great REIC here in the New York area. Meetings are about once a month and there are always interesting speakers and a lot of like minded individuals to speak with.

I was also incredibly skeptical about having to mail my rent check upon moving to the USA. This is just something that isn't done in other countries. I mean who writes checks anymore and who in their right mind would put a monetary instrument in the mail. I wouldn't mail you cash, why would I mail a check? I've lived here 7 years now and I still don't get it.

In my case, I live in a 100+ unit apartment building and the management company does not have electronic payments set up. I could possibly understand a smaller landlord not having electronic systems set up but even then, give me your bank details and I'll do a transfer.

My favorite country to live in so far was Kenya. With poor infrastructure generally, they just skipped trying to put bank branches and ATM's everywhere. Banking is done almost exclusively through cellphones (and I don't mean smart phones). All phones are "pay-as-you-go" and everyone has a small business selling "air time" (which is pretty much credit on your phone for making calls, sending texts or sending money). You buy air time for the amount you need and then you simply send a text message to the person you need to send money too. They go to the person on their street that sells air time and texts the air time to them and they give your counterpart the cash. It works perfectly on an old fashioned Nokia brick phone. And I still have to write a check, put it in an envelope and buy a stamp and mail my rent check... Just seems hopelessly old-fashioned.

RANT OVER...

Oh, and, if you do buy the place. You're going to be the super-evil landlord that raises everyone's rents by 100%. As a tenant its great to spend little but as a landlord, you want to maximize receiving market related rents.