Someone I work with has six rental houses.

[onehandle]

All have lost significant value.

All have renters who have lost their jobs and are late on rent.

There was one time when I would have been impressed with someone owning six rental houses.

And the Bush Depression marches on...

[meegbear]

1. Does he own them outright, or are there mortgages?

[havocmom]

5. OT, but that is the greatest sig line in a really long time!

:thumbsup: & :yourock:

[onehandle]

11. She and her husband have mortgages. nt

[MadHound]

2. Couldn't pay me enough to be a landlord, especially in these times

When my father died by sister and I were left with a couple of rental houses that he had. Since we had to live up to the contract I was doing the landlord thing for nearly a year. It was a royal pain, especially evicting one renter who was months and months behind on rent.

Never again. The only property I want to worry about is my own.

[ferrous wheel]

17. Many landlords become slumlords by default. Chances of getting a renter who will

take reasonable care of the property are down there between very slim and none. You couldn't give me one or any number of houses if renting them out was a condition...I would burn them down first.

[CoffeeCat]

3. I know a couple of people who own...

...rental properties as well.

They were flying high a decade ago. The money poured in.

Both of these people are writing off losses on these properties--because the renters lost their jobs
and broke the contract---and they can't get other renters.

These are nice properties. Condos that have reasonably priced rent.

To top it off, the owner of these properties just lost his job at Wells Fargo.

So...there ya go.

[Doremus]

15. We have a rental house and lease it to a lovely Section 8 family.

The rent is paid on time, we get to do our small part to end the cycle of poverty and the children have a nice safe neighborhood to grow up in. It's all good.

Tell your friend to look into it.

[Raksha]

38. Wow, that's one economic stimulus item that would have an immediate effect.

Expand the Section 8 program to 2-3 times the size it is now, so that there's no longer a 3-year waiting period JUST to get on the waiting list!!!

[Uben]

30. We are not immune to hard times....

This bad economy has us all looking for answers! I am fortunate to live in a region that is still experiencing growth, so times are good right now. That has not always been the case.

[KittyWampus]

4. In the town I live, all the retail buildings in town are owned by a few and the rents are INSANE

to make a living, a business has to pull in $10,000 a MONTH. That was last I heard from a small business owner about 6 years ago. Don't know how high they've gone by now.

Needless to say, the Mom and Pops have long since fallen by the wayside and been replaced with corporate designers who are happy to lose money and have a tax write off.

I am not so thrilled with landlords who own lots of property. Especially if they milk it for all it's worth.

[Uben]

6. If it weren't for landlords....

....where would people who cannot afford a house live? Forgot about that, huh?

I own two rent houses and 158 apartments. All have been paid for for years. I make a nice living off of providing nice housing for those who either choose to or cannot afford to own a home. Yes, it's a hassle, but like I said, I make a nice living. Owning rental properties is not for everyone. If you want a landlord to be compassionate, pay your rent. Can't pay your rent? What's the alternative? Sorry, you are not going to sponge off of me. I will evict you in a heartbeat! You entered into a contract to pay on time...every time. If I bought a house from you and quit making payments after three months, would you let me keep it? Hell no!

There are no free rides. Work, pay taxes, die. If you want to try to scam people out of their money......go to prison. That is the biggest free ride our government offers. A roof over your head, three squares, and free tv. And, we all pay for it!

[Vinnie From Indy]

7. Didn't that old codger in the movie "It's a Wonderful Life" give the same speech?

I think his name was Mr. Potter. I agree that rental properties are absolutely vital for folks to find housing. I do find amusing that you equate losing one's job and not having the money to pay rent as "scamming". Don't ya think that these people whose lives are crumbling around them because they might have lost their job would rather be able to pay rent?

[Uben]

26. Of course

Wouldn't you rather I get rid of tenants that cannot or will not pay rather than letting my credit go to crap, or the house go back to the bank? Sorry, I didn't take them to raise. I am in a business that requires people to pay me on time so I can pay my bills on time. I will not risk my credit on someone else's misfortunes. I cannot save the world, but I can give people a nice home to live in at a reasonable rate. As long as they are willing to pay on time and take care of my property, we're all happy.

If you want welfare, go to the government. They have more money than me.

I was laid-off three times before I finally got smart and went into business for myself. I've been there, and there was no one waiting in the wings to hold my hand and make everything alright.

[CBGLuthier]

42. go back to the bank

You said you owned the property free and clear, why would the bank take it back? I don't really care if you have no compassion and are only interested in yourself but try to keep your "story" straight will you.

[Uben]

43. I do own my properties....

...but not all landlords do. I was trying to make a point, obviously one you cannot grasp. And, personally I don't give a damn what you think of me. You are nobody.

[Vinnie From Indy]

44. LOL! You must be a joy to be around

I still think your general comment that folks that do not pay their rent on time every month are scammers is bit whacky. Many very good people are now and will be in desperate positions due to the economy and not all of these people are out to have you support them. In short, sometimes bad things happen to good people.

Also, everybody is somebody even if you don't like them.

[SammyWinstonJack]

8. "Work, pay taxes, die." You forgot too add, "And pull yourself up by your own bootstraps."

:wow:

[davsand]

9. Good luck finding support here.

Seriously, there are more than few on here that do not get it, and next to organized religion and labor unions I am hard pressed to think of any group less appreciated here than landlords.

Just sayin...


I know a lot of guys who have abandoned the entire rental market. They got out within the last 18 months or so, and without exception they are GLAD they did. These guys were businessmen that kept their properties up and took care of their renters. They also expected to get rent on time, EVERY time. That started to be an increasing issue and even finding renters with a clean history became problematic.

Their logic was that it is only gonna get worse, so they sold out.


:shrug:


Laura

[onehandle]

12. Well that was nice. I wasn't passing judgement on the renters or the landlord.

Boy did you miss the point.

[arcadian]

16. 158 apartments, is that correct?

Boy, mommy and daddy sure were generous with you.

[ferrous wheel]

18. Oh, nice. You know the poster's circumstances? A magic 8 ball, no doubt.

:eyes:

[Raskolnik]

41. What a snotty thing to say. n/t

[Gabi Hayes]

19. I can't WAIT for the point at which most of your ontime renters can't make the nut.

what are you going to do then?

do you have enough squirreled away to ride it out?

I sincerely hope you end up in the same circumstances you deride those less fortunate as you, and find yourself at the mercy of someone as heartless as you

enjoy yourself

[Uben]

22. Friend, you have no idea

I come from very humble beginnings. Every landlord has had tenants who could not pay. Every landlord has had tenants that have destroyed his property. I'm no different.

I rented one of my homes to the gal who cut my hair. At the end of the one year contract, she was three months delinquent. She is a hard working mother who had three jobs. She chose to use her money to help her grown children rather than pay her own rent. She owns a house, but chose to move out of it and let her kids have it, and rented from me. They could not keep a job to support their children and my tenant took on that responsibility as well. Her choice. She stiffed me for $2400. She purchased a brand new car the week before I asked her to leave. What would you do?

When lay-offs forced a bunch of my tenants at the apartments to be late on their rent, I worked with them. Many are still there, others had to move on. The rents I charge are very reasonable and fair. That is why I currently enjoy 100% occupancy with a waiting list.

My worst tenant was a young police officer. After one year, he had caused thousands of dollars of damage to my house. His wife worked out of town and he worked second shift. They had two kids. The neighbors said he would let the kids roam around outside with no diapers while he slept! You can imagine what the inside of the house looked like. When you opened the door, the smell of urine floored you! Every wall in the house had crayon, pencil, or ink pen marked up as high as the kids could reach. Even the kitchen cabinets! The $500 deposit did not even touch what it cost me to put that house back in living condition.

We all have our horror stories, but 90% of my tenants are good tenants. I have late fees for those who cannot pay on time. It let's them be flexible while giving me more tolerance for their delinquency. I have tenants that have been with me for twenty years.
I'm not an asshole. In fact, I am probably the most understanding landlord you will find. Everyone has their limits, and I have mine.

All my properties are paid for. I have enough money to last me the rest of my life. In reality, I don't need the headaches that come with being a landlord. But, I enjoy making nice housing available for those who need it and appreciate that those who give a damn take care of that property. For instance, I give December's rent free to good tenants who have been with me for more than two years. Have you heard of a landlord doing this? Yes, it reduces my profit by 8%, but it keeps people in my homes, thereby keeping me from having to turn it over. It helps them out at Christmas and they don't forget about that when taking care of my properties.
It is just smart business on my part.

[Gabi Hayes]

25. spare me your rationalizations

friend

you revealed yourself in your initial post

nobody forced you into your role in life

if you don't like it, get out

sell everything off

buy an island

not so easy to sell these days, though, is it?

maybe you can live in a car with somebody you've put on the street

enjoy yourself

[Uben]

28. You're so quick to judge

You don't know me. I let my tenants speak for me. A lot of my tenants come from referrals from other tenants, and we have a waiting list for the apartments. I'd be willing to bet that I give more time and money to charity than anyone you know.

I have received numerous offers on the properties, but where are you going to get a better return on your money? Banks? The market?
Some people have bad luck. I have had mine.

I work with several different charities for children, fund-raising and actually taking them fishing, boating, swimming, and cooking for them. I do this at least five times a year for our Youth Center kids and a group of mentally challenged kids. I am involved with CASA (court appointed special advocates for children). I purchased an inflatable sixteen foot movie screen and hold outdoor movies for them, free of charge, one weekend a month for six months out of the year. My wife is chairperson of our local youth committee. We raise thousands of dollars a year for our kids. Do you? If you do, thank you! If not, don't waste your time judging those who actually do something to make someone else's life a little better.

[TwilightGardener]

32. You have no need to defend yourself--it's reasonable to expect rent to be paid.

You sound like you have fair business policies.

[Raskolnik]

40. Are you volunteering to pay laid off workers' rent?

You're awfully generous with other people's money, aren't you?

[uncle ray]

21. i bet many of your tenants work much harder than you do.

and get much less in return.

and FWIW it it wasn't for landlords buying up all the cheap houses to use as rentals, then more people could afford to buy a house.

[Uben]

24. That is shear ignorance

Every person has the same opportunity to find a good deal as a landlord. We do not have any inside advantage other than we physically go out and look for deals rather than wait for one to drop on our heads! There are millions of homes for sale right now, what is stopping them from buying one?

[Uzybone]

10. Someone I supervise has 2 rental homes (paying mortgage)

2 years ago it was all good, last week the person was asking if they could get an advance on their paycheck to pay the car note. How times have changed.

[tjwash]

13. I've been lying awake at night thinking about my rental properties...yes.

I had to suffer through the 90-92 RE crash and burn as well. Goes with the territory.

[Uben]

23. We take the good with the bad.....

...if a lot of these people knew what we went through, they wouldn't own a rent house for anything!

I'll be selling the houses when my youngest daughter, 16, gets out of college. They have already paid for my oldest, 26, to get her MBA. At that point I'll fully retire. I have a property manager and on-site manager for the apartments and my maintenance guy has been living there rent free for 18 yrs. I have four other employees who enjoy very generous year-end bonuses, insurance, and above average wages.

[madinmaryland]

14. Keep repeating "Bush Depression". nt

[TwilightGardener]

20. Here's something I can't understand: If you live in a home and pay a mortgage

for yourself and your family, and you make a standard middle-class income, how do you go about securing mortgage loans for multiple properties at the same time? Why would a bank approve you--do you have to make a certain very high income to be qualified for multiple mortgages? Do you have to tell them you intend to rely on renting it out continuously to make the payments on it?

[ozu]

31. Refinance.

People who had existing mortgages would take their equity from the rise in real estate prices, refinance, and use that money as a down payment on the next property. Rinse and repeat. With the lending standards that were in place, the banks would just take your word that it would be rented out, you didn't even need to document the income.

This type of real estate speculation was a major factor in driving the housing market to unsustainable levels.

[TwilightGardener]

34. Interesting, I didn't consider equity/refinancing--guess THAT little game is all over now.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

33. It used to be to purchase an investment property 20% down was pretty

standard. It meant you had "skin in the game" and you could afford to invest and it gave the bank a Loan to Value of 80%. You were supposed to demonstrate that the anticipated rentals would pay for the expenses. If they did, you owned a piece of property that you probably anticipated selling in the future, but someone else was paying it off for you.

As part of our stupid banking crisis, formerly sane bankers decided to give 100% loans to a public crazed by infomercials and workshops to become "real estate investors" in order to escape their own crappy wage-slave lives. Investor involved sales accounted for as much as 25-30% of the market which led to inflated prices due to the increased demand which meant that these investors paid inflated prices and are now deeply into the negative equity world along with the difficulty in finding stable employed tenants. So, for many people right now it sucks to be a real estate investor. Blame the banks for their irresponsible underwriting.

[TwilightGardener]

35. Thanks--more food for thought. I asked because I had a supervisor

at work who owned seven rentals, and paid mortgages on at least half of them, and yet I had a pretty good idea of how much he made (and it wasn't that much). I thought, why are banks falling over themselves to lend to someone who already is sitting on at least three or four active mortgages? When you consider the entire debtload he probably carried compared to his income (even with his rental income), it just seems...risky, if you can't find reliable tenants. I guess you almost have to present a business model to the bank, like a small business start-up would have to do.

[Uben]

37. There are other ways......

A lot of landlords sell their homes once they get too tired or too old to keep them occupied, or they're just tired up putting up with tenants. I plan to sell mine in a couple of years, and I intend to do a contract for deed. Whether it be to a current tenant or someone else, I will probably let them go for about 10% down and sell them at a discount. They have both paid for themselves at least twice! It's a good way to put your kids thru college if you are pretty good at painting, carpentry, plumbing, and household electrical....which is why I bought them to start with.

[old mark]

27. The guy who recently installed out wood pellet stove owns a oretty large

apartment building about a block away from our house. He told us he LOST $30000 on it last year because of increased costs and needed repairs. (It has oil heat.)

We were thinking of buying a large rental property a few years ago, and I am very glad we didn't now.

mark

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

29. Investment properties only really make money when you sell them.

I have a Friend who has inherited free and clear a nice house in a great area where there is high demand for rentals and the rents are fairly high. Even though HE HAS NO MORTGAGE, a fair rental for the house will just about cover the cost of taxes, insurance, maintenance and upkeep not even counting any vacancy time, which there always is in a rental. There will be some left over, but really not that much considering the potential aggravation with tenants, etc. It has been a real eye opener.

I think investment property made more sense when the affiliated costs of ownership were much, much lower (taxes, insurance, etc.). It almost doesn't make any sense right now.

Also now, you have the situation where the landlords' credit/mortgage issues become the tenant's and the tenants are losing their housing through no fault of their own.

[haele]

36. We rent a house - our management company is having hard times right now -

Part of what we pay $1500 a month for is maintenance on a small house built in 1946 that the owner inherited in 2000 before housing appraisals shot up(so far as I know, still owns free and clear)and "gardening"(mowing the lawn - they don't even weed!).
No maintenance has been done for 8 months now, and the lawn mower hasn't shown up for two months.
I was talking to the manager, they're down to 70% occupancy, had to let go of 4 people in what was originally an 8 person office, and are trying very hard to convince the owners not to raise rents.
Meanwhile, we have three cracked windows (untreated dry rot over the past 3 years have finally claimed 2, an accident - teenager - claimed another), cracks in old door frames from where the house is settling, rotting patio, old peeling paint - exterior and interior, a dry-rot infested bathroom cabinet and back yard where the weeds and grass are going on two feet tall.
Everything else we're responsible for, but dang it, the house is old, they already indicated they won't reimburse us on rent if we spend money out of pocket to fix normal age issues unless we get prior permission - which the manager told us "don't even try, we can't afford it right now"
Yes, I'll go out and weedwhack/mow once the rainy season is over, (because the dog hates going out there to do her business now - who knows what lurks out there?) but it's pretty sucky out there, even if one tries to take care of a place they're renting. And we're still paying an extra $50 a month or so for the supposed gardener to come by twice a month?
Drop my rent by $50 a month, and I'll eagerly go out at least once a month over the weekend and mow. Drop another $50, and I'll engage in some real landscaping - tilling, mulching, and re-seeding with drought tolerant mixes, because I won't have to deal with constantly repair the damage their cut-rate lawn mowing company has done to the property by trying to mow the grass down to dirt for two weeks a month over a 2 year period...
Reimburse my receipts, and I'll start doing some of "day job" repairs that I used to do as a kid at my parent's house and with my own house many years ago - painting, frame repair, linoleum replacement, wall patching - so the owners can get it back in decent enough condition that they can do their retirement remodels as they are planning after we move out.


Haele

[Uben]

39. You sound like a great tenant!

I would love to have a tenant like you and would gladly make doing those things worth your while. I rent my homes for $525 month....very reasonable by todays numbers. I have no trouble leasing them, but am very picky who I put in them. Not many places in America where you can get a three bedroom home on a large fenced lot for that amount of money. In return for the lowered rent, I expect my tenants to treat my property as if it were theirs, ie. mowing, trimming. I do all repairs or call a contractor for those things I cannot do. Since landlords prefer long term tenancy, it is only reasonable to give incentives for people to stay in them.