When it comes to tenant screening, the 'net is a great thing... I just had a prospective tenant call me, and when asked 'why is he moving', his answers were not consistent.  BTW, I like to ask 3 times when the first response to that question is anything with the word 'landlord' in it.  He went on to tell me that he 'told' the landlord that he was moving, and he wasn't getting evicted... well, he got half of it right.  While on the phone, I asked his name and current address, logged onto our local District Court website and did a search on him.  Yep, you guessed it... his 10 day eviction notice to move was expiring today (no wonder he needed a place asap).  He acted surprised that I found this out so fast, and argued about the fact that I found his prior eviction from June on there also, even though 'he didn't really get evicted'.

Now, normally I don't do this, but I kindly told him that 'you gotta love the internet', and that he needs to find some other sucker landlord out there to let you rent from him and then kick you out', and then hung up.  Sorry, it must have been a bad day today, but I hate getting lied to.  Had I not checked him out, I would have taken my time to show him the place across town, just to find that he's a 'professional tenant' later.

Also, be weary of the ones who state 'I can pay you cash today'... flags shoud pop up all around.  Cash now means even more court costs tomorrow.

Hope this helps,

Jeff Lund

Investment Property Specialist

Five Star Real Estate

jefflund@grar.com

Hello everyone,

Just wanted to give you a website that grades your website. websitegrader.com analyzes what your website has (and what it doesn't), and spits out a great report that you can look at where your site needs work.

You can also type in additional websites (5 of your competitors) to compare to yours... try it out!

Keep in mind, getting a score that's over 90 out of 100 is a fantastic score, and very few sites score over 95...

Hope this helps,

Jeff Lund

Five Star Real Estate

Director of Eduction and Technology

Investment Property Specialist

jefflund@grar.com

 

Hello Everyone,

I just got an idea on collecting larger amounts of application fees... and making it easier.

Several times prospective tenants ask if there is an app fee, and I often waive the charge, in hopes to get more appicants to choose from.  I have found that requiring a large fee upfront will sometimes cause an otherwise good tenant to not want to even show up.

When a tenant views a property, I tell them that there is a $20 application fee, to be collected when the lease is signed.  This way I still get a fee charged, and I don't scare them away in the beginning.

Different areas do different things, so I would be curious as to how others charged, and how much.

Jeff Lund

Five Star Real Estate

Investment Property Specialist

jefflund@grar.com 

 

Hello everyone,

I keep watching the ads on tv about Direcway (now called Hughes net) about how you can enjoy high speed internet access anywhere, as long as you have a view of the southern sky...

I had this sytem for years, and dropped it for the following reasons:

1) Ask them about upload speed, not just download speed.  Upload speed is how fast you can send items such as emails with pictures.  This system is very slow (comparative to dial-up), and in our business, this is important.

2) You lose connectivity when high winds or storms occur.  We had great signal at all other times, unless we had heaavy rain or snow storms.  I thought this was a fluke, but we have sat. tv also, and it is similar; but I'm not as worried about watching a tv show as compared to performing a CMA and losing all my data because of signal loss.

3) If you are looking for 'high speed internet', look into all other possibilities before you sign up... our connection speed averaged about 500kbps.  You can check your internet connection speed at speedtest.net (upload and download).  Thier system may have improved over the past year or 2 but it doesn't hurt to ask first.

Hope this helps,

Jeff Lund

Five Star Real Estate

jefflund@grar.com

 

Hello everyone,

In our local area, there has been advertising on the radio about your chance to receive a free laptop... ok, what's the catch?

freelaptopnation.com is a legit site, but I read the program requirements, and it seems as though you are required to fullfill a vast amount of 'sponsor offers' and/or get someone elso to join in.

It seems to me that by the time you perform all of their requirments, you could have gone online or to the store and bought a laptop, saving you time and money in your business.  How much is your time worth?  Are you sure you are getting a laptop that will suit your real estate needs?

I looked at yahoo answers, and it seems as though I'm not alone in this thought.

I would be very interested in anyone who has gone through this process, and what they encountered, but at this time, I'm sticking to a reputable online or local store to buy my computers.  It's a write-off anyways, right?

By the way, "the company may, at it's sole discretion, terminate any account and deny any gift without prior notice for any other reason at the discretion of the company"  'Paragraph 5'

Hmmm...

Jeff Lund

Director of Training and Technology

Five Star Real Estate

 

 

Hello everyone,

I just wanted to tell you about a software program that helps you type faster... all you do is talk, and the words appear on your screen!

Last year, I was diagnosed with Transverse Myelitis, which slowed my abilities to type, which is an important part of my job!  Check out my blog on T.M. here.

Dragon Naturally Speaking by the company Nuance is a great tool for handicapped, or someone that writes books, or just someone that can talk faster than type.

It takes a bit getting used to, but it's worth it!  You actually have to 'train' the software to your voice, but it only gets better and better for you, and I see about a 93% accuracy rate (which is better that if I manually type).

Tip: Getting a voice recognition-quality headset is a good idea also, as they offer more quality in the microphone.

Hope this helps,

Jeff Lund

Director of training and technology

Five Star Real Estate

 

Hello everyone,

I heard this idea recently, so I thought I'd pass it along:

If you have the older 3 gallon tank toilets in your rentals and You pay the water bill, consider replacing them with a newer, 1.6 gallon toilet.  This relatively small amount of expense will save lots of gallons of water, thus reducing your water bills, while helping to conserve water- GO GREEN!

Another even less expensive way- fill up a couple of 12 ounce pop bottles with rocks or marbles, cap it and place them inside the tank, thus making the water usage smaller inside the tank.  Be careful on this one... you may not have enough water to flush down everything that needs to be flushed, so don't over-do it.

By the way, there are different sizes of traps inside of a newer toilet, so be sure to get the largest (something like 2 inches or more) to avoid plugs from your tenants, thus reducing your plumbing calls for stoppages.

Hope this helps,

Jeff Lund

Five Star Real Estate

Investment Property Specialist

jefflund@grar.com

 

Hello everyone...

If you're looking for specific photos, you might want to try www.istockphoto.com , where you can purchase the rights to use photos for as little as $1.

We all know that the internet provides us with lots of photos that you can 'copy and paste' for our use, but copyright laws may come to a head.  Using a site like this lets me sleep better at night.

Jeff Lund

Five Star Real Estate

Investment Property Specialist

jefflund@grar.com

 

Hello everyone,

Just a quick reminder-Photos need updating...

Yesterday I was setting up showings for today, and I noticed that 2 of the homes I was to set up had SNOW in the main picture on the mls... wow, we haven't had snow for at least a month now!

When I was calling the agents, I nicely mentioned this fact, and that it might be in thier interest to have a new photo uploaded.  Either these 2 agents were(are) too busy, or this was just an oversight... but I figured that it would be better to hear this tip from a fellow agent, and not thier sellers.

I also offered to take a picture of the front of the home for them, and email it to them for thier use.

Jeff Lund

Five Star Real Estate

Investment Property Specialist

jefllund@grar.com

 

 

Posted by Jim Harger | The Grand Rapids Press April 26, 2008 00:25AM

Categories: Breaking News View larger map | This map shows the location of HUD-foreclosed homes in Grand Rapids last December. Since then, some of the homes may have been sold to private owners and will no longer be available for resale by the city and local non-profit housing developers.

GRAND RAPIDS -- In today's crowded real estate market, the house at 936 McReynolds Ave. NW doesn't show very well.

The front porch could use some TLC. There are holes in the plaster and the addition out back is rough, with its plywood flooring and broken storm door. Graffiti scars the garage door.

The 123-year-old house, which hasn't seen a nibble from buyers in more than six months, has company. Next door, there's a boarded-up duplex. Across the street and a few doors down are two other vacant victims of the foreclosure epidemic.

City officials and nonprofit housing developers have a rescue plan for this and about 125 other houses that have been foreclosed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The plan calls for HUD to sell them to the city for $1 each. The city then would offer the houses to nonprofit developers, such as Lighthouse Communities or the Inner City Christian Federation, to fix up and re-sell at market prices.

"This is a very creative approach to an intractable problem," Mayor George Heartwell said.

Though details of the plan still are being worked out, local HUD officials are on board with it.

"The objective is to stabilize neighborhoods," said Louis Berra, head of the local HUD office.

Berra's office is holding the titles to about 125 homes whose federally backed mortgages went into foreclosure. All of them failed to sell after at least six months on the market.

Selling them to the city and getting them into the hands of non-profit developers is the best way to get families back in them as soon as possible, Berra said.

"We could hold the properties, but that's not going to help the neighborhood, either," he said.

Eric Soucey, a city economic development official, said city leaders want to get the houses back into the marketplace at a price that won't harm the market for other homes in the neighborhood.

"Our goal is to protect the value of the other private properties in the neighborhoods," he said.

Soucey also wants to make sure developers don't cherry-pick the best houses and stick the city with the worst ones. The houses will be divided into four categories and developers will be required to take from each, he said.

While some of the $1 homes will generate a profit for the developers, other homes in poor condition will require significant investment before they can be sold.

David Allen, executive director of Lighthouse Communities, said his agency is willing to take between 50 to 100 of the houses. He wants to get them into the hands of families who have lost their previous homes to foreclosure.

Allen hopes to develop a lease-to-purchase program that will allow the families to live in the homes for up to three years while they restore their credit.

ICCF President Jonathan Bradford said his group can repair up to 10 houses a month and get them into the hands of low-to-moderate income families. ICCF may not completely remodel the homes, but they will install high-efficiency furnaces and make certain all parts of the home are in good condition, he said.

Bradford said the opportunity to acquire and fix up the foreclosed homes is a risk worth taking to protect the $13 million the ICCF already has invested in the city's housing.

"This is pretty big stuff," he said. "It requires a certain amount of guts on the city's part to be responsible for this amount of houses.

"It also requires a certain amount of optimism and fortitude on the part of the non-profits," he said. "But if you look at the alternatives, you just have to do it."