My Spanish is at about the level of a 3 year old ;) The callers will either keep it extremely simple, or put someone on the phone that does speak English.We haven't signed a lease with a non English speaking tenant, but my attorney said the official language of leases is English and if they sign it without understanding it, they are still bound by it.

Finally put your agreement with the money guy in writing, probably didn't need to be said but sometimes simple things are overlooked.

Thanks for the post Brandon , simple and really useful.See youAlejandro

I've found there are often a variety of opinions about how to do thing that seem simple.

An appraiser usually has the sales price data and mls access and simple needs to reverse engineer the process.

Larthsa,To figure cash flow, you list all of the monthly expenses, Principal and interest, taxes and insurance, add in any utilities, HOA fees, etc,,,then you need to figure out a fair figure for "reserves', this is a hold back amount for the hot water heater breaking etc,,,then figure in a percentage for vacancy (most will use around 5% if its easy to lease) if your going to have a management company manage, their fees,,then add,,,take the final figure and take it from your monthly rent, and you SHOULD have your cash flow (if I missed anything anyone please chime ini)If you want to figure your "cash on cash" return, figure out how much you will end up in the deal for in cash (deposit, rehab, closing cost paid in cash etc, all expenses you will pay in cash), thats your total "cash" in the deal,,now see what your annual cash flow from the property should be, divide that by the cash you have in the deal, and you should have your cash on cash.You can do this with a simple spreadsheet, it makes it very easy to look at deals, but remember, these numbers are only right IF the estimates you put in are right,,,including the anticipated rent,,too many new investors tend to under estimate expenses and over estimate rent.andy

For letters or simple postcards - you can't beat yellowletters.com!

I know there could be simple explanations and I'm not asking for a list of those.

These are pretty simple fixes, but you have to go to the root of the problem.

Just because a neighbor was able to deal with it in a simple fashion doesn't ensure you will be able to.