All Forum Posts by: Douglas B.

As always, excellent advice from the knowledgable BP community. My wife and I suddenly had the thought that maybe we should switch our focus from duplexes to storage units. This is the first thread we found! Thanks everyone for telling us the reality of things.

as always, excellent advice. Thank you all.

Alright, well, do you have any advice regarding my plan to buy duplexes for under 30k in inner city areas with high crime and renting to section 8 tenants?

Our vision would be to carefully screen and select quality tenants and then to maintain the property well and provide a higher quality unit than others in the area. Since we down the place outright, we could take the time to select the right tenant.

Our main concern right now is the high crime area. It's a bad section of the city. But the numbers work on the property. It should pay for itself outright in 2 years or so. Appreciation isn't an issue. We figure that even if things go horribly wrong somehow, we could literally walk away, learn our lesson and try again. So I don't really have anything to lose. Still, we'd like to do it right the first time. But the crime makes me wonder if it's the right move.

so tell us more, @Account Closed . Tell us the good, bad and in-between.

so George, you're doing that work yourself or you're hiring contractors to do the rehab work?

what's the monthly cost? It sounds great.

I've heard it said that business income is handled differently than traditional earned employee income. Can someone explain this in an example for me? For example, how is $10k of earned employee income taxed differently than the same amount of rent generated on an investment property? I haven't yet bought my first property but I'd like to understand this better before taking the plunge.

(Sub30kclub)

anyone have experience with the Buffalo NY rental market? There are a lot of very low cost duplexes here but they're in higher crime areas like the east side and west side. Does anyone have any experience renting in these "rougher" areas? I've personally lived in some pretty rough neighborhoods and I've never had problems. I think that for the most part such labels are overrated. But I'd like to hear from experienced landlords.

Anyone have experience with Buffalo area Section 8?

Doug

I guess I should also mention that I'm intending on renting to section 8 tenants in a city where there are pockets of crime such as drugs and gangs. I'll be trying my best to improve those areas by buying into the transition zone neighborhoods and providing safe, quality housing. But to make that happen, I'm anticipating a need to screen below age 18.

Perhaps in some areas this type of juvenile screening may be unnecessary but in my target area crime is a real potential. I think I can weed it out with careful screening, but if I don't background check, then I'd be just taking a chance.

All the things I've read say that meticulous tenant screening is ESSENTIAL. I know numerous investors who have skimped on screening and they've been burned. In fact, I honestly don't know anyone personally who screens tenants well. But all of the 10+ landlords I know personally skimp on screening and they struggle chronically with tenants causing problems and not paying. As a renter for years myself, the only times I've been personally background checked were twice when I rented from apartment complexes. None of my SFH or duplex landlords have ever run a check on me, even when I rented in a very bad neighborhood. My in-building neighbors there did drugs, didn't pay regularly, and the guy upstairs wore a police leg parole gps tracker. Super nice guy to me, but clearly had some serious criminal history and I know was a cocaine user and pot smoker while I was there. He was nice, but I don't want to be his landlord. Lol.

I wonder if anyone else rents to tenants in potential high crime areas. Do you screen minors?

I've learned some more about running background checks on minors.

1. My attorney says it's legal in NY for me to require criminal background checks for anyone I want who will be applying for tenancy. I agree with the above advice to have a policy that states who will and won't be checked and to stick with it. I suspect I'll likely screen down to a younger age, specifically to root out juveniles with a drug or weapons history. I haven't yet determined the specific age, but certainly 13+

2. I learned that in many states juvenile criminal records can be "sealed" and made invisible to criminal background checks. However, there is a waiting period around 5 years before that can happen. So, it's likely that a teenage criminal WILL show up on a criminal background check. In order to have his record sealed, the offender must maintain a clean record for that 5 year period also.

3. A parent must sign a waiver to run a background check on a minor. I'm allowed to require this.