We bought a property with a relative. We paid the down payment and legal costs, etc. and have 50% ownership. We are all on title. That was four years ago. He has been living there and paying all fees: mortgage, condo fees, etc. We have equally shared one special assessment and there is one...

QUOTE (ZanderRobertson @ Nov 24 2008, 08:34 PM) couldn`t agree more... everyone ought to post their own views, it`s the only way to have a great conversation, and think differently. BUT, calling someone "unsophisticated" or "negative" is name calling for sure! I apologize for offending. I...

Stephen, it`s not about "believing", it`s about becoming knowledgeable and about basing one`s decisions upon evidence. No one in REIN has ever said that the real estate market goes straight up non-stop. So the market is down. That`s not shocking news. It`s entirely predictable. By using...

QUOTE (Jack @ Nov 23 2008, 01:41 PM) You would find it in the local paper, because it`s news-worthy. Exactly why I`m posting it here, because it offers informative value and because it`s relevant to real estate. Ah! I see the problem here, Jack. You naively and mistakenly believe that...

This month we launched our first website, and I am very excited about it. It`s still in the infancy stage, but we have made excellent progress in a few short weeks. It has nothing to do with real estate, but the writing that I am doing for the blog, the articles that I am developing and a plan...

QUOTE (EdRenkema @ Nov 23 2008, 11:14 AM) Jack give it a rest, if you want to accuse someone of whining look at yourself and all the articles and questionable `advice` you`ve posted. Pretty much all reactive stuff, the people here are simply trying to create a proactive, positive, supportive...

QUOTE (kennicoll @ Nov 9 2008, 08:54 PM) we currently have a 3br townhouse in chelsea villas renting for 1450.00 we are thinking 1700-1800 would be more in line cheers ken Really? What are you basing that figure on? I did a search online tonight and the rents are much lower than that. I...

I have some 3-bedroom duplexes in Grande Prairie, and my tenants` leases are up for renewal. They are both excellent tenants. One has been there for one year (a company) and one has been there three months. They are both paying $1600. Question: should I be raising my rents? How much are...

QUOTE (SusanPenner @ Sep 11 2008, 09:39 PM) I think I`m just naive or missing the whole boat on this one. Why do we care if our tenants/clients have insurance or not? When I was 18-22 and in university I was under my parents insurance...not that there was anything valuable to steal and I...

I know that this topic has been addressed before, but I can`t find the thread. We have five adults who want to move into our 3-bedroom duplex (two couples and a single). Should we be charging extra rent in this case? If so, how much and how do we word it on the lease? Thanks.

An insurance agent recommended adding a clause to our lease requiring tenants to purchase tenant insurance and indicating that they would cover the $1000 deductible for damage that was caused by them and required us to make a claim. Has anyone done this before?

Thanks, Garth.

I just heard from our PM that the tenants moved out!! Thankfully, they didn`t decide to hang around and force us to take legal action. I haven`t heard the details yet, but I`m very happy to clean the place up and find a quality tenant. Thanks to everyone for your help. I sent the comments and...

This is Grande Prairie and our PM is new at this, but he is a far sight better than the "experienced" companies that we have dealt with. At least he is honest and cares about our property. He is learning, but he`s putting his best effort into it. We are trying to help him through this...

We have a bad tenant whose rent cheque bounced. Our PM gave him 14 days notice. Then we found out that he had two dogs in the house (against the lease), that the previous PM only collected 2/3 of the security deposit, etc. He said that he will move out at the end of the month and that he will...

I would like to retract my previous recommendation to GP investors to use Exit Realty for PM. We have had several bad experiences with them and have had to pull our properties. We have lost a good deal of money because of their bad judgment and bad managment. We are still cleaning up the...

We are only a year into our investments and as a result of a bad tenant, we have to spend some money on one of our units. Question: where does the money come from? We have some cash flow reserve building, but we had a few months vacancy, etc., and we are wondering if we take money from our...

Good idea, Garth. I should have thought of that myself.

We just fired a Grande Prairie PM company because when we evicted a tenant and the security deposit was returned to cover lost rent and damages, only a portion came to us. As a matter of fact, they didn`t return it until we hounded them about it. Then we received a casual email from the PM...

We would like to bring our daughter into our real estate business so that she can help us move up to the next level in terms of working with JV partners, promoting and marketing our business, etc. What she has to offer are strong administrative skills. She`s great at doing many things that we...