Saturday, May 09, 2009

Landlording Anyone?

Well, the house deal went down the drain and with a crappy appraisal, and a boatload of foreclosures on the market right now, we had our realtor come and get the sign out of the yard. Soon, we'll begin looking into property management companies and see what's out there that we can afford. It looks as though most operate at 10% of gross rent and that figure would put us somewhere around $50 in the hole every month depending upon taxes and insurance. I think that it's a small price to pay to have my daughter close to her extended family though. I do think that after tax season, we could break even due to our ability as landlords to write off of prop. mgmt. fees, depreciation, property taxes, and ...get this...travel to the rental for inspection/checkout. I harbor no illusions of this thing being anywhere near a cash flow situation at any time in the future. This will merely get us by until the market comes back up to our original sale price and increase our equity in the house at the same time.

7 comments:

Callie said...

So.. are ya'll still moving ?

AMorris said...

Dunno yet. We're still kinda shocked, but we'll start investigating the rental option this week.

TDP said...

Have you checked into house swapping? A friend of mine had a house in Taos but needed to move to Maine. They found a couple in Maine that wanted to move to Taos. They legally swapped mortgages, deeds, etc. with just a small haggling about value. Just a suggestion.

How frustrating for you to have to go through all that!
Seems that the great American Dream and its nightmare darkside are not as far apart as we all grew up to believe.

$50 in the hole each month is a small price, in the big scheme of things. Good luck with your decisions!

AMorris said...

Interesting thought on the house Bird, but we want to get into a lower value place in KC to have some room for a little bit of cash flow after we fix it up and hopscotch to the next house. Thanks for the kind words. We'll make it through. At least it doesn't hit 120 degrees down here in the summer. =0)

Chile said...

So sorry to read this painful process drug out so long and has not had a happy ending yet.

If ya need some homemade liqueur to dull the shock, I've got a new batch of limoncello started. Ya'll are also welcome to come sample last year's experiments.

Angel likes bellyrubs. I'm sure your little one could manage that. ;-)

AMorris said...

This story only gets better. One of our nice neighbors recently rented his place so he could move in with his dying mother. The thing is, I don't think he really screened the people. In a week, there are mariachi concerts and polka beat sing-alongs nightly - as an added bonus, there's the requisite car up on blocks - in a WEEK! Who needs to go to S. Tucson when it comes to us?!

AMorris said...

We gotta get out of this place....if it's the last thing we ever.....