Posts Tagged ‘fixer upper rental houses’

Don’t Make This Mistake, If You Want to Keep Good Tenants

Saturday, September 1st, 2012

Where’s the problem?

The issue of respecting tenants’ privacy is really close to my heart, based on a perplexing experience that my wife, Angy, and I had.

Shorty after we were married, Angy and I were experiencing marital bliss on a our honeymoon in Mexico. We rented a house near the beach, and after a few days we mentioned to the landlord that the kitchen sink was draining too slowly.

The next day was Saturday, and we still in bed that morning. Angy was sleeping and Terry was reading The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, when we heard the back door opening. It sounded like two people were entering.

A happy Spongebob-ish called out, “We’re here to fix the sink.”

Terry yelled, “Hey, why are you guys here so early? We’re still in bed.”

The Spongebob voice said, “Sorry, we have a tight schedule to keep. It’s not easy being a handyman you know.”

“What did he say?” whispered Angy.

“He said its not easy being a handyman.”

“Well, that’s his problem isn’t it?”

“I would have thought so.”

Terry shouted out, “Can you guys come back later? We’re not prepared right now. And if you could avoid unloading your burdens on us we’d really appreciate it.”

“Come on,” said the cheerful voice, “we can fix this pipe in two shakes.” We could hear random tools dropping on the floor and bouncing around, followed by an exclamation of “Oops.”

“And we are really good guys. I read poetry and I’m good at carrying on interesting conversations.”

“And, I write novels,” the other one with a goofy, Patrick-ish voice chimed in, “although I haven’t had any published yet.”

Objections to the contrary, we had our sink fixed and the handymen did turn out to be pretty good guys. They became our friends over the course of our stay.

Although this was just a light-hearted incident, it was also an example of violation of tenants’ privacy. Not only is it wrong from a courtesy perspective, but it is also against the law to enter the premises without the tenant’s permission, except in an emergency.

The more you can make the tenants feel it is their home, like keeping a handyman poet and a Pulitzer Prize wannabe from showing up unannounced to their private living space, the better your relationship with them will be.


 

"Fix ’em Up, Rent ’em Out" now available at amazon.com!

Wednesday, October 17th, 2007

My book “Fix ’em Up, Rent ’em Out: How to Start Your Own House Fix-up and Rental Business in Your Spare Time” is now available at amazon.com.

Editorial Review:
This book teaches how to get started buying, repairing and renting out fixer-upper houses in your spare time. It covers various aspects such as house selection, what to repair, handling tenants, managing the books, and taxes. The book describes the two safest ways to make money in real estate, and one chapter is devoted the “Zen of Repairing Properties.” The author uses illustrations from his own experiences, humor and motivational examples to encourage the reader down a path that will be both financially rewarding and deeply satisfying.

Comments on “Fix ’em Up, Rent ’em Out”:

“Great information for anyone starting out in the fixer-upper business. Easy to understand, written by an author who has served his apprenticeship in the trenches.”
— Fixer Jay P. DeCima, Investor and Author

“Terry Sprouse has created a profitable rental business with his family in their spare time. He’s accumulated more net worth in six years than most people have after a lifetime of saving. What sets him apart is he took action.”
— Bob Zachmeier, Investor, Educator, Author

“Sprouse has created an approach to home restoration and wealth generation that works. This book provides simple guidelines for restoring homes, but also weaves in guidelines for restoring sanity to our crazy lives. Sprouse has the wit of Will Rogers and the business savvy of Donald Trump. His simple, direct, honest philosophy of sustainability and responsibility is profound.”
— M. D. Matlock, Ph.D., P.E., C.S.E., President, American Ecological Engineering Society, Award-winning designer of green neighborhoods for Habitat for Humanity, Professor of Ecological Engineering, University of Arkansas.

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Should you attend a real estate boot camp to learn about investing?

Thursday, September 27th, 2007

Should you invest in fixer upper rental houses the old fashioned way, or try to learn it all in 2 days?

Yesterday, I received an email announcement inviting me to a real estate boot camp. It read,

The Ultimate Investor’s Bootcamp!

“You’ll Be Spoon-Fed Cutting Edge Tactics & Insider Secrets. And You’ll Walk Away Knowing Exactly How To Create Stunning Business Success & Vast Amounts of Positive Cash Flow.”

New investors must wonder, “Do I need to attend workshops like this to learn to invest in real estate?” It sounds tempting to be able to learn everything you need to know about investing in 2 days. Who wouldn’t want to take a shortcut like that?

My response is that you might learn some good techniques on investing at a bootcamp, but is it worth the money? I’ve been to free introductory presentations that say you will learn money making techniques about real estate investing, but it turns out to be a sales pitch to get you to sign up for an expensive “mentoring” program. Since the email with the above ad did not mention any price for the bootcamp, I imagine its not cheap. The important thing about bootcamps and mentoring programs is that you can spend a lot of money and only learn a little information. Worst of all, you can get roped into buying a program that sounds good, but may not be as good as it sounds.

My philosophy is more of a “do-it-yourself” approach. I like to cut corners, save money, and not take too many chances with my money. I’m the kind of guy who wears both a belt and suspenders to hold my pants up. I really like play it safe.

To get started in real estate investment, I would recommend to start by reading some of the excellent books that are available, such as “Investing in Real Estate” by Andrew McClean and Gary Eldred. I think you can learn more from reading a book like this than you can from going to expensive seminars. It provides information on many aspects of real estate that investors should know, without having a hidden agenda to get you to buy something more. I have mentioned other useful books in earlier blog postings, such as those by Jay DeCima, Bryan Wittenmyer and John Schuab.

You can also learn very useful information by taking real estate investing courses taught at local community colleges. I took one when I was just starting to invest, and it was outstanding. It was taught by a real estate agent who was an investor. The students learned all of the basics from someone who was actually investing in the same community where we would invest. I learned basic techniques that I am still using.

You learn by visiting a lot of houses and talking to owners and real estate agents. Practice calculating how much monthly payments would be for houses that you visit. Talk to other real estate investors. After you have a idea of how the process works, and when you can recognize a good deal from a bad deal, buy a low-priced fix-up house and learn to repair it as you go along. That’s what I did, and 7 years and 6 houses later I am still going strong.

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Unclog a Shower Drain – another tip from Bryan Wittenmyer’s “Perpetual Income”

Tuesday, September 11th, 2007

Another excellent tip for us fixer upper rental house investors, from Bryan Wittenmyer in “Perpetual Income: How to Generate Cash Flow from Low-End House Investment,” is how to cheaply unclog a shower drain.

Wittenmyer suggests 1) pouring several quarts of boiling water down the drain to dissolve the old soap. Repeat this process after five minutes. Then, 2) following the hot water with a gallon of Clorox to dissolve the hair clogs. For the price of a $1-$2.00 bottle of Clorox, you have saved the cost of a plumber’s visit.

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