On being a landlord

odd you should bring this up. my brother manages a dozen apartments for my father who is 90 and enjoying retirement. he had to evict a guy who had multiple surgeries and no health insurance. he tried to work with him for the last 6 months, but eventually, you can't afford it any more than they can. it's a sad situation. sometimes, they're just losers, but we truly felt bad for this fellow. after watching my parents as part time landlords most of my life, i could never do it. it's a no win situation.

 

I would never want to be a slumlord.

 

that says more about you than it does about me.

 

We have tenants who slowly but surely got way behind on the rent. (The house is next door. It became clear that they were not going to be able to ever get even, but they were too proud to talk about their situation
He had lost his job, unbeknownst to us. And of course lost his health insurance! After we finally sat down with them and found out what was going on, we got them in touch with the VA, Social Security as well as some local social service agencies. These were people who had been living the American dream, simply middle class, doing all the right things, their kids raised well etc. At the age of 58 he couldn't get a job, anywhere, his age working against him at every application. Finally, after all of us working it out, he was able to get Social Security Disability due to an old injury (the only thing that saved them!) She works full time cleaning houses, and they were supporting his aged mother. Now, they were one step away from being on the street! We made a deal with them to stick with them and to give them as much help as we could. After about a year of partial payments, the Social Security issue worked it's way out, the VA kicking in the health care for him anyway, we worked out a payment plan. We wrote off the back due rent. They now pay a somewhat reduced rent, and they work the rest off by doing a modicum of yard work at their place as well as ours.

These people are living examples of how the middle class has been sold down the river in the last generation. It is a morally bankrupt society that throws hard working people, who have done everything right their entire life, under the bus! Most middle class American's don't realize how close to they are to being on the street. Mercifully we could afford to take a bit of a hit, to help good people through their hardship

Icarus

PS. The only reason we are a land lord is that we bought the house to protect ours from bad neighbors. Under normal circumstances I don't wish to do so.

 

it's wonderful that you could afford to help them out. it's amazing how many people don't have any family to help when they lose their job etc.

 

In fact they do have family, and the family chipped in as best they could. The adult daughter has medical issues with one of her children, the son is just 19 just starting to get some real blue collar work.

Last year, I tilled up part of the yard for a community garden that they do the work on, we all get to eat out of it. No skin off my nose, but a big help to them. The tend our chickens when we leave, they get half the eggs. It is not like these people can't (and don't) work hard, it is that our society has thrown them under the bus, after contributing all these years!

Icarus

 

My GF has a fantasy where we buy another house and rent out the one we are living in. I have a fantasy where I never become a landlord or buy another house ever again. :madgrin:

 

We have a property manager who manages our single family residences. In 7 years my property manager has never had to evict anyone.

Though I've never meet any of my tenants, I've discovered through the internet that one is a pastor of a Christian church and another makes his living being in a Christian rock band.

 

Oh yeah, I tried the rental property thing for awhile in the early 90's. If you have great tenants, you have it made. Once a bad tenant moves in, it quickly goes downhill

I too would be willing to bend over backwards to help somebody. We very often throw somebody under the bus because its convenient

 

A word of advice that is worth exactly what you pay for it. Don't buy rental property unless you are either hard core heartless, or you hire property managers that are, if you car about getting you rent.

I owned a number of rentals in the late 70's and I heard every story under the book, some true, many not. It always reminded me of Cpl Klinger on MASH.

He would walk into Col. Potter's office, "Sir, Sir, you have to send me home, my father's uncle just died!"

Potter calmly turns around, pull out a file from the cabinet behind,
"let's see Klinger, last week, mothers uncle, the previous week, brother's wife's sister died, previous week, mother's uncles wife's sister,,,,,"

Icarus

 

We can understand why it can make you sorta feel badly for another persons plight in life.

For the properties we have outside of Cali, we have a local property management company deal with the place and they get 10% of the take. We aren't bothered with the issues of the place at all...


Here in Cali... it's me... but I don't have a problem with my tenants.

 

:first: :drum:

 

A REIT index fund is real estate without the hassle.

Notice how many of the situations above would be vastly better for all concerned if the US had national health insurance. Lower the age of Medicare eligibility to zero and we're there.

 

I'm the opposite, but for the same reason. My house in Cali is taken care of by a property manager, but for my house her in Mass, I take care of everything myself (even though "take care of" usually means "call a contractor").

 

True. But you can't leverage x dollars of reit with .25x dollars where a 5.5% 30 year fixed loan can be assumed and the interest can be deducted against income. Also with a REIT you can't enjoy deducting 1/27.5 of the value of your structural property against your income.

 

Sort of like being a bomber (or drone) pilot. You get to engage in the war in a very sanitized way. You get to go home at night without ever having to experience the results of your actions. I certainly understand it, but I think that having a connection to ones actions leads to a healthier world.

Just my opinion. I guess the same can be said of much of what we do. we use electricity without (most of us) having to see the problems that coal produces. We eat meat, but don't have to visit the slaughter house to cite just a couple,,,,

Icarus

 

"The trouble with socialism is that sooner or later, you run out of other people's money."

--Margaret Thatcher

 

Why don't you go tell those crybabies who were hit by those tornadoes. Oh, boo-hoo-hoo! Hey, Uncle Sam, bale us out!

#&@*ing Socialists.