The padding will help prolong life of carpet.

They are not your friends/good terms, they are using the friendship to prolong it....it never works out.First sign was when they were pushy trying to tell you what to do with the other tenant...your the boss.

Hey Everyone, Sorry about the prolonged radio silence.

Go in with sufficient cash reserves - don't use every dime to get into a property and leave yourself with nothing left to survive a major cap ex issue or a prolonged vacancy. 

The Trust needs to be the buyer to keep that individual in line with the estate.While you could do all this with L/Os it prolongs the issues of transfer and the future loan is a state of limbo, even with credit issues addressed, IMO.

However, holding on to vacant property for prolonged periods of time carries its own risks (I have read about squatters, for example, here on BP-- though I doubt this would happen in my type neighborhood). 

I am a city slicker - I love the country and the small town life but have never really experienced it in a prolong setting.

As far as the actual bottom goes, that is going to depend upon how hard an administration makes it for those who would like to put money into the economy.Governmental laws (local as well as state and federal) that require investors to loose money by waiting longer in order to do something will force some of those out of the market that would otherwise invest and this will prolong our reaching the actual bottom.

If those tenants don't pay, they have already gotten two weeks free before you even get a chance to find out whether they pay or not ... that is in addition to the prolonged timetable for an eviction.

We have been in a prolonged period of super low rates,  but historically 7% is not bad.