Do-It-Yourself Landlord's Blog

The main point of being a Landlord is to profit from sound, practical investment. This is understandable fact. It is understandable because it is the capitalist backbone of our entire system of freemarket ownership for things with speculative rates of appreciation. Namely: real estate. But there are other important, and arguably more socially responsible facets of being the proprietor of where other people sleep. Where they raise their children. Where they celebrate holidays. Where they experience life.

In that context, there are other responsibilities that need to be lived up to by Landlords. And some appear too cold-hearted to understand that. This is most unfortunate.

It’s yet another installment of “Don’t Be That Landlord�.

Apparently, and this should really come as no surprise to anyone, tenants do not approve of unsolicited sexual advances. Who would have known! Seems to me that a pool of people who you depend on for money would be a PRIME set of folks to risk royally PISSING off by way of creepy requests for sexual favors!

Some people simply shouldn’t be in a position of authority. Spiffle’s Landlord is amongst that group of people.

And then there’s the oh-so-typical issue of mold in the unit. For the love of pete, this should not be a problem in modern times. Leaks are more than a mold problem for a Landlord. Leaks ruin foundations, destroy ceilings, wear away at expensive bathroom tiling, stain or warp valuable flooring, and cause endless damage to the sticks that build up a unit. But the mold is what will likely cause a Tenant to mount a legal offensive. It is also what will cause a potential Tenant to pass, or a current Tenant (who pays on time and causes no other problems) to vacate. Make routine checks, and reassure your Tenants that it is in their benefit to report leaks to you as soon as they notice them.

Because really, it’s in your benefit too.

There are a host of web-based real estate tools out there for anyone looking to acquire, revalue, or manage their properties. What I see out there is that because of the last few years being dominated by moving of single family homes, almost all of these tools are geared for the buyers with that intention.

However, there has to have been some thought put into these online services that allows for them to be easily used by those of us who are in the business of finding, acquiring, and reassessing rental housing. Hm.

Neighboroo.

The apparent purpose of Neighboroo is to throw up some nice regional statistics such as Crime (they apply their own weighting system to this, giving more weight to "violent", versus "property" crime), Politics, Elementary School Rankings, Cost of Living, and Median Income per zip code, on a google map of the US.

The pros:

Very simple interface, with obvious left hand navigation. The data provided is actually useful in doing some very top-level, simplified analysis for a given region. Nice, quick snapshot. Plus, this is a brand-spankin’ new company, and I’m honestly not even sure where they plan on going with this. I just happened across it while searching for similar internet sites.

The cons:

Not really deep on the data side. Sure, it goes down to zip code, you can even type a specific code in and get your results in an arrowed bubble, but many times zip code isn’t precise enough a measure when sniffing around a potential new investment area. And the “Population Density� section concerning race is a bit, well, racy for my taste. For an investor of my variety, the only color I’m ever concerned with is green. The rest is a waste of my time.

Side note: What would be REALLY cool is if there was a time-warping feature where one could see stats like these from the past. Perhaps it would help clue an investor in on income/population/rental value trends. Perhaps.

All-in-all, I’m going to chalk Neighboroo up as a “work in progress, with much promise�.

One of the tenants in a duplex was wondering about the future offering/bundling of cable/internet into his lease. The basic notion was that he’d pay a premium if these things were already installed and ready to go immediately upon move-in.

You see, he just moved in fairly recently, and had to have these services brought up to snuff by his lonesome. And as we all know, getting these services up and going can be a thorough pain in the time-consuming ass. It took almost a month for everything to be properly wired and operational. Plus he had to take time off from work to supervise the process.

Plus he has yet another monthly bill to stamp or pay online, and the hassle is apparently beyond reproach.

So I got to thinking about this. After all, I’m always on the lookout for additional revenue streams associated with my property. Why not handle all the difficulty associated with these services and simply charge a premium for it? Offer it as an additional service of the lease?

Well, after some picking around the interweb, I’m not quite as excited about the idea.

To begin, there’s the equipment involved. Routers, modems, signal amplifiers, hubs, and a myriad of wires or connectors. These will all have to be serviced/inspected/replaced by the Landlord. An additional appliance, in effect. More warranties and extensive hassle to keep up with.

So I figured, well, to simplify that nonsense, just go wifi and cut the appliance cost in at least half, along with centralizing the equipment to one location for easier service. Having less equipment with the same service makes for better economies of scale.

But then I remembered how dependable my own wireless network is. Or how undependable it is, rather. And that there are an almost infinite number of reasons why a wireless network may or may not be working. Which brought me to coffee shops who offer “free wireless access� but don’t guarantee anything. Sow when the wire goes down, the wireless hub goes on the fritz, or the user’s laptop is simply janky, the coffee shop owner won’t get an immediate demand for repair.

Because it’s free.

And that’s the only way I believe I could get away with offering/bundling internet access on my properties: essentially, I’d be giving it away but hiding the cost in something else. That way, I wouldn’t be getting calls every two hours because the stupid wireless hub is acting up. Again.

Now if there was just some way to get around the potential legal ramifications…