Using Credit Cards

mrsonedollarallowance3 Comments

Credit card rewards can be lucrative. In 2020, we earned $1,616 in cash rewards based on our credit card usage. That’s money in our pockets that we did nothing except spend other money to get. Plus, over $1,000 of those rewards are in the Chase Sapphire rewards account where the points are worth 50% more when redeemed for travel (i.e., they’re really worth $1,500).

I understand that credit cards can be trouble for some people, but I struggle to believe that people can’t learn how to use them properly and reap the benefits. I’m not here to provide personal financial advice, but perhaps our use of cards and our experiences can help you form your own opinion.

The most common excuse I hear is, “I don’t trust myself.” It takes discipline, but the internet has made tracking your balance even easier. Instead of having to go to the bank/ATM or wait for monthly statements in the mail to know your account balance, you can check it online whenever you want. Either keep a check register to manage your expenses on your credit card as if it’s using a checking account, or get in the habit of checking your balance daily. Heck, as soon as you spend something on the credit card, go into your checking account and pay that amount towards your credit card immediately. If you’re someone who regularly gets hit with insufficient funds fees, this probably isn’t the first step in your money journey.

We don’t pay cash for anything. Everything goes on a credit card unless it’s prohibited or there’s a service charge that outweighs our rewards.

We pay off the balance of every credit card every month. We have never paid interest on a credit card balance.

CASHING IN ON REWARDS

The simplest way to collect rewards is to have an all-category-cash-back credit card (e.g., 1% cash back on all purchases). However, we have several credit cards, and each have a different purpose. It’s more work to keep track of the spending categories and know which card to use in which situation, but if you take those few seconds to think of the right card, it can pay off in the long run. Over the years, the categories for each card have blended together as card companies compete for business and expand their reward programs, so we use fewer cards than we used to. We still have 5 that get used regularly.

Typically, one of our requirements is that it have no annual fee. However, we do break our own rule with one of the cards. If you look closer at the benefits the rewards cards offer that require an annual fee, you can compare to your lifestyle and decide if that fee will be worth it. I highlight each card we use here, but there will be an upcoming post specifically geared towards Chase rewards.

Chase Freedom: This card has different spending categories per quarter that it offers 5% cash back on, and you’re required to activate the rewards each quarter to earn those bonuses. The current category includes purchases at wholesale clubs, internet/cable/phone services, and select streaming services. Typically, we use this card the most when it’s a gas-spending category, which is usually one quarter per year. Other reward categories we have seen are grocery stores, restaurants, entertainment, or department stores, for example. There is a maximum amount of rewards that can be earned each quarter. There’s a lot of fine print associated with this type of card, so you need to make sure you’re aware of what counts and what doesn’t within that category.

Chase Sapphire Reserve: This card has an annual fee – $450. This seems steep at first, but the benefits of this card make it worth it for us. For one, you automatically get $300 worth of credit for travel-related charges (e.g., AirBnB, flights, hotels). The credit happens instantaneously when the charge hits. You earn 3% points (one point is the equivalent of a penny if cashed out) on all travel and dining purchases and 1% points on everything else, but if you redeem the points earned through their travel portal, you get a 50% bonus. We’ve booked several hotels, rental cars, and flights through their portal with the points earned. Right now, they’re also offering the 50% bonus on grocery store, dining, and home improvement purchase credits. You’re given access to select lounges at major airports through Priority Pass, get reimbursed on the fee for TSA Pre-Check or Global Entry, and earn an annual $30 credit on Door-Dash purchases. There are many more perks for this card that you can find on their site.

Citi Double Cash: The card provides 1% unlimited cash back for all purchases, plus 1% unlimited cash back for all payments made. We quickly learned that taking the rewards as a statement credit didn’t count as a ‘payment,’ so we didn’t earn 1% back for that. Since then, we transfer our rewards every month or so into our checking account, essentially giving us 2% back on all of our “everyday purchases.”

PNC Everyday Rewards: This card isn’t offered anymore, but a similar card (PNC Cash Rewards) is available. Our card offers 4% cash back on gas, 3% on cinema/movie rentals, 2% on groceries/restaurants/fastfood, and 1% on almost everything else. We use this card mostly for gas purchases now that we have the Chase Sapphire Reserve (used for restaurants and travel). This card also offers several worthwhile bonuses each month, but it’s on you to activate the reward before using it. For example, I currently have 10 days left on a Panera offer to “earn 10% cash back on your Panera Bread purchase, with a $2.00 cash back maximum.”

Bank of America: This card isn’t offered anymore. We’re earning 3% on online purchases, 2% at grocery stores and wholesale clubs, and 1% on all other purchases. When Mr. ODA got the card, the 3% category was used for gas, but BoA recently created the ability for the customer to choose their 3% category. Since PNC has 4% for gas, we were never able to take advantage of that for BoA and thus changed it to online purchases. So now, every time we order from Amazon we get 3% back! Before we were even dating, Mr. ODA didn’t appreciate that Mrs. ODA didn’t have a rewards credit card. He signed her up for this credit card the first moment he could. It literally went like this: Mr. ODA opens a computer and says to Mrs. ODA, “what’s your social security number?” We’ve since let my card close because we had the same card, and his card was more useful because if he deposits the rewards earned into a BOA checking account, he gets a 10% bonus on them. (Note: We let it close due to inactivity versus actively seeking closure on it because that card’s credit limit and history were useful to Mrs. ODA’s credit score. We’ll get into strategizing credit scores in a future post.)

Think about your lifestyle. Do you have a credit card that maximizes each activity or category of spending that you need (travel, dining, grocery, utilities, subscriptions, online purchases, gas, etc.)? Try and find the happy medium between the number of cards you need and your sanity in keeping up with them. Remember that even 1% cash back on purchases is better than $0. Try to use the cards that hit the most categories for how you spend most of your money.

OPENING NEW CREDIT CARDS TO MAXIMIZE REWARD BONUSES

Back in the summer of 2017, we were faced with a tough decision – find a way to pay for In-Vitro Fertilization or stop our quest to have a child. We had already spent thousands on infertility, and IVF was the next step. It was a minimum $22,000 to the doctor on top of what we already paid, and that didn’t include the medicine that was purchased separately. We were offered a personal loan through the doctor’s office – at 7% interest. Technically, we could pay for the procedure with cash, but we didn’t really want to liquidate stocks, we certainly didn’t want to pay 7% interest when it wasn’t absolutely necessary, and we thought it best to earn rewards on such a balance. That’s where a credit card came in.

We opened a new credit card that offered an introductory 0% interest rate. We basically gave ourselves a free loan. We also selected a credit card that provided an introductory bonus of some sort (e.g., spend $5,000 in the first 3 months and receive a $300 statement credit).

To utilize this approach, you need to be able to pay the monthly minimum requirement; if you miss a payment, you lose the introductory rate and have to pay the interest that would have accumulated on the balance from the beginning. On top of being able to pay the monthly minimum, you also need to have an idea of your financial status over the next year because if you only pay the monthly minimum, you’re going to be looking at a big balloon payment at the end of that introductory term.

Then in December 2019, my pregnancy with our second child became high risk. We knew that we would be meeting our deductible of $3,000, plus any other medical costs associated with my hospital stays and delivery. We opened another credit card at 0% interest to cover those expenses. We then had several expenses that we didn’t expect, but were able to put them on this 0% interest credit card (cars needed work to pass inspection, rental properties needed large investments (main water line replacement, roof, HVAC replacement), and insurance premiums). We paid over $25,000 of expenses between February 2020 and February 2021 on this card.

Each time, we could have paid off the card within the first few months if we wanted to push it. However, we kept our funding more liquid to make it work for us instead of going towards 0% interest debt. We paid well more than the minimum each month, and as we got closer to the end of the introductory period, I projected out our finances to ensure that we didn’t use our money to pay down mortgages when we would need it to pay off that credit card.

Basically, within reason, anytime we know a big purchase is coming, we open a new credit card to maximize the new account bonuses and not having to pay off or pay interest on those purchases for 12-15 months. This usually happens about once a year to 18 months. We find this is an appropriate spread of time to keep up with tracking, not having too many hard inquiries on our credit, and not violating restrictions that credit card companies have on opening too many accounts in too short of a time period.

If you’re smart with credit cards, they can be a powerful tool to wealth building, free travel, and creating other financial flexibilities.

Two Years of Changes

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On the surface, a jump of $1.1 million in just over 2 years seems impossible, but here’s the break down of how things changed in our finances during our child-rearing hiatus.

The highlights:
– Mrs. ODA left her job;
– We purchased three new properties;
– We sold one property;
– We paid off two mortgages and significantly paid down two others;
– Our investments grew based on market fluctuation, as well as our continued investment; and
– The value of the properties we own appreciated.

401K

Since I met Mr. ODA, I maxed out my Thrift Savings Plan (TSP, the Federal government’s 401k) contributions each year. Before that, I had been putting money into the TSP, but hadn’t maxed it out. I left my career position in May 2019, at which point I stopped contributions to my TSP. However, we put in as much as we could for the year before I quit (if Mr. ODA has his way, we’d have maxed out my contributions); I contributed $13,070 over the first 4 months of 2019. My balance on June 30, 2019 (it’s a quarterly report) was $300k. I have gained $127k over 19.5 months based on my investment strategy for the account with no new contributions. Mr. ODA continues to max out his contributions of $19,500 per year. His account balance has increased due to annual contributions, a loan repayment, and market fluctuations.

IRA AND TAXABLE

A Roth IRA has maximum contribution limitations per year. For 2019, 2020, and 2021, that amount is $6000. We each put $500 per month into the Roth IRA to max out the contributions. We have maxed out the contribution limitation every year we’ve known each other (10 years), and Mr. ODA had done so before Mrs. ODA knew such a thing. We don’t time our contributions throughout the year because we don’t want to stress about when the perfect time is and then possibly end up throwing five grand in when December rolls around. We have taken the ‘set it and forget it’ (essentially dollar cost averaging) approach to the Roth IRA investment.

Dollar Cost Averaging – Since we know we want to put $6,000 in for the year, we break it down into $500 a month and contribute on the 30th of every month regardless of individual pricing. This eliminates the need to pay attention to, and the effect of, volatility in the market. Some may say that dollar cost averaging is not a prudent idea because the market always goes up over time (essentially you’re setting yourself to pay higher and higher per share as the year progresses, on average), but I just can’t handle the psychology of dropping $6k on January 1 and not having anxiety for the rest of the year that it was the right decision.

As for the taxable accounts, this includes accounts we have set up for our children – UTMAs (however, the growth of these funds are not taxable to us because they are taxed at the minor’s rate – 0% for us). An UTMA is the Uniform Transfers to Minors Act. It allows an account to be set up in the child’s name without the child carrying the tax burden of the money. The IRS allows an exclusion from the gift tax up to $15,000. We put $50 per month, per child, into the account. This is also ‘set it and forget it’ with automatic deductions from our checking account.

CASH

Our cash balance really has no meaning. We bring in income and we pay our bills. We don’t purposely keep a savings account balance (as I shared in the Leveraging Money post, we’re not interested in maintaining 3x our monthly income in a savings account at 0.01% interest rate). We don’t purposely project how much to put towards mortgage principal.

We currently have a larger-than-normal cash balance, which is left over from selling our primary residence in September. It hasn’t been dwindled lower yet because we have a fence install that needs cash and we were paying down the last of our large credit card. Now that most of these things have happened, we’ll put more of our cash balance towards the investment property mortgage we’re currently paying down.

PERSONAL MORTGAGE

In October 2018, we had been living in our previous house for just under 3 years. In January 2021, we had only made 1 mortgage payment on our new home. While our current home cost slightly less than our last home and we put 20% down for each house, we had more years of principal pay down in October 2018 than we currently have.

PERSONAL RESIDENCE AND VEHICLES

We sold our Virginia home for $400k in September 2020. The valuation of that home rose significantly over the 2019-2020 years due to lower inventory with high demand in the Central Virginia area (probably all over the country, but I don’t know those details).

Also in September 2020, I traded my vehicle in for a van (and I couldn’t be happier :)!). That increased our vehicle valuation since the van is 3 years newer and a higher cost than my previous vehicle.

Even though my vehicle value rose slightly, Mr. ODA’s vehicle’s value continued to decline, and we purchased a home in a lower cost of living area, therefore having a lower value.

INVESTMENT PROPERTY VALUES

Since October 2018, we’ve purchased 3 properties, increasing the total property value of our portfolio. Additionally, all of our properties continue to increase in value. The Virginia homes have increased significantly over the last two years. In the table below, I’ve provided each property’s change in value from January 2020 (oldest snapshot per property I have) to February 2021.

Note that this is a projection based on the internet’s valuation and not an exact science. The only house that we have a recent appraisal on is the one that we refinanced in January 2020. That house’s appraisal was $168,000; we paid $112,500 in July 2017.

INVESTMENT MORTGAGES

Of the three most recent purchases, one was purchased with a partner, split 50/50, and the other two were the last two KY houses purchased. These three added $215k of new debt. However, you see that our mortgages on investment properties have only increased by $27k, which doesn’t exactly say “we bought 3 new houses.” That’s because we’ve paid down (and sold) about $150k of mortgages in addition to 2+ years worth of mortgage payments going towards these loans.

In May 2020 and January 2021, we refinanced two properties. Quick tidbit – we signed the refinance papers in May under a tent in a parking lot, and we signed the January refinance at our kitchen table with a traveling notary. While the interest rate and monthly payment decreased, the loan balances increased because we rolled closing costs into the principal and took $2,000 cash out (the maximum allowed) in each case.

We sold one property that we had been paying down the mortgage on; in October 2018 it had a balance of $11,142, and we sold it in January 2019. We had been paying down the mortgage because it was our lowest balance. When we made that decision, selling the house wasn’t in the immediate future. An opportunity presented itself, and we sold it.

We’ve paid off two mortgages during this period. One was in January 2019 with a balance of about $44k, and another was in April 2020, which also had a balance of about $44k in the October 2018 calculation. Our intent to paying off mortgages was two-fold. It increases our monthly cash flow that helps Mrs. ODA stay home with the kids, and it gets Mr. ODA closer to being able to leave his job. Plus, due to Fannie/Freddie requirements of having no more than 10 conventional loans, it creates the opening for us to get a new mortgage if the opportunity arose. The downside is that it de-leverages the house’s financials and creates a smaller cash-on-cash return for the property.

We have also paid down 2 mortgages over the last two years that aren’t completely paid off.
– One of those properties is the one that we purchased after October 2018 with a partner. It has our highest mortgage rate. The affect on the numbers here just shows that the principal balance of that mortgage is smaller than it was originally, thereby not increasing the mortgage total ‘fully,’ if you will. The principal pay down on that mortgage has been $44k total, but we’re only responsible for half of that.
– On the other mortgage, we’ve paid almost $28k towards principal between October 2018 and now.

CREDIT CARDS

We open new credit cards with 0% interest for an introductory period when we have large purchases looming. Not only is the 0% interest beneficial to us for an introductory period of 12-15 months, but we strategically choose new cards that come with a welcome bonus (points or cash) when you reach a moderate spend level in the first several months. Given the strategic timing of a new card before a large purchase, this bonus is easy to achieve. When we have large balances on credit cards, it’s because we’re purposely carrying a balance month-to-month at 0% interest. We have never paid interest on a credit card balance.

LIFESTYLE

Despite Mrs. ODA leaving the workforce, our net worth increased for all the reasons listed above. The one unmentioned piece, because its not directly tied to any accounts, is lifestyle. While our net worth, rents, and investments have increased, our lifestyle has not creeped. We still make strategic decisions, spend money mainly on needs, look for wants that provide our happiness without breaking the bank, and generally keep our financial future at the forefront of our daily lives. We live like no one else does so eventually we can live like no one else can.

Living intentionally allows us to get to where we want to be.

February Financial Update

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I had so many things to share, and now it’s time for another net worth update, but I hadn’t gone into the details of our 2019-to-2021 changes! I promise, it’ll come.

SPECIFIC LARGE CHANGES FROM LAST MONTH’S UPDATE

We paid off $5,000 left on one of our credit cards. This credit card was opened for a large purchase, and the 0% introductory rate expires at the beginning of March, so I wanted to make sure it was fully paid off so we don’t pay any interest on the balance.

We put $2,000 towards an investment property’s mortgage, and we received $2,000 cash out from another investment property’s refinance.

MONTH’S EXPENSES

Every month, $1100 is automatically invested between each of our Roth IRAs and each child’s investment accounts.

Between our personal home and the investment properties, except for the one that we refinanced so we skip February’s payment, we paid about $5,500 in mortgages. To put this in perspective, we brought in over $8800 from those properties, which doesn’t count $900 worth of rent at this time that the tenant is late on. This doesn’t include the properties that we own with a partner through an LLC, which nets us $400 each month (although one of those properties hasn’t paid rent this month yet either).

  • Our grocery shopping cost us $409.
  • We spent $76 on gas, and $72 eating take-out. We typically visit family once a week (45 miles round trip), go to the grocery (10 miles round trip) once or twice a week, and get take out once a week (10 miles round trip).
  • I made two Amazon purchases for non-grocery items we needed (e.g., activities for our 2 year old, vitamins, items for our daughter’s 1st birthday, and – really important – potty training seat), which totaled $125.
  • We owed personal property taxes from last year’s time in Virginia, so I paid the $94 for that. I also paid the balance of our personal home’s HOA, which was $85 for the rest of the year.
  • As for the investment properties, we had to purchase a new washing machine, which was $528 (although that cost is split with our partner for this particular house). We also paid for the insurance on a property that isn’t escrowed, which was $203.

$430 went towards utilities. This includes internet, water, sewer, trash, electric, and investment property sewer charges that are billed to the owner and not the tenant. Our electric bill was insane this month. We moved into our new home in November and had previously been living with gas heat so didn’t know what to expect. Mr. ODA called the HVAC company to have them run a diagnostic check on our units, and we found that the downstairs condenser isn’t working. It isn’t resolved yet due to an ice storm here, but hopefully it’ll be fixed today, and we hope to see some sort of compensation for our high electric bills due to this not working properly.

SUMMARY

Our net worth increased by $102k from last month’s update. This change is due to fluctuations in the stock market and the value of the houses. Our 401k balances increased over $35k, our taxable investments rose over $10k, and home values increased over $42k all together. A difference of over $5k in our credit card balances also contributed to the change in net worth.

Tenant Satisfaction

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A tenant moves out. Days without a tenant in the house equate to less income. On top of that, you probably have to touch up paint or repaint. You have to clean the carpet. You have to clean all the appliances and bathrooms. You may have to replace an appliance. Then there’s the extreme, that you may have to hire a junk removal company to get rid of the debris left behind and then hire a cleaner that charges a hazmat fee on top of the cleaning fee (does it sound like I’m speaking from personal experience?).

Turnover is when one tenant moves out and another moves in. The goal is to make that period of time as short as possible, or even non-existent. There aren’t always scenarios that you, as the landlord, have control over, but making a tenant feel appreciated and heard can keep them living under your roof for more than the initial lease term.

When a tenant leaves, in the best case scenario, you’re losing 1 or 2 days of income ($80). However, it’s also taken us up to 2 months to get a unit rented. That means you’re making 2 mortgage payments without income to offset them. When calculating your cash-on-cash return, the assumption is typically 5% vacancy rate, or about 18 days per year without rental income.

Then there’s the work you need to do to get the unit ‘rent ready’ again. Again, the best case scenario is cleaning the house and paint touch up. We now pay someone to come in and clean the house between tenants; it became worth the $100 to have someone come in, with the right tools, and be done a lot faster and better than I could do. The preference is to not have any carpet in a house, but we do have a few that have carpet that will need cleaned between tenants ($125). We do our own paint touch ups, so it’s typically no cost except my time because we have a standard paint color, and therefore left over paint. Quick tip: if you’re not painting the whole wall, use a paint brush to touch up the areas that need it, and then go over it with a roller to help blend it together, then you won’t see those touched up spots.

However, there may be more work to do than those quick, simple tasks that you can have lined up for 1 or 2 days. Even if the tenant treats the house great, appliances and carpeting have a useful life and may need to be replaced, which involves ordering and scheduling installation.

The end goal: keep tenants happy and not wanting to move means more money in your pocket. Find compromise and don’t always focus on your bottom line – and your bottom line will likely end up thanking you.

In 5 of our properties, we haven’t had any turnover (owned anywhere from 1.5-4.5 years). In 3 cases of turnover, the tenant left due to a job relocation. We’ve had 2 evictions. Our turnover rate for the average years we’ve owned the properties is 1.75, so the majority of the time the tenants renew their lease.

How do we do it? We create a relationship that says we’ll be responsive and listen to issues, we’re reasonable and fairly lenient with paying rent on time with sufficient notice and justification, and we provide houses that are in good condition.

We had a tenant vacate a house due to a job relocation. She had such a good experience with us, that she set us up with a new tenant for their house. Then a year later, she moved back into town and reached out to me. She said they had such a terrible experience with a landlord that if they were to rent again, it would only be from us. We just happened to have a tenant moving out because that tenant was buying her own house, and our newly vacated house fit all the parameters she wanted. That meant we had 2 days of turnover and didn’t have to list the property.

That house really needed a new paint job. We hadn’t painted it when we purchased it, and now it’s 3 tenants in. We didn’t know that until the tenant moved out and didn’t have time to paint the whole house before the new tenants were moving in. To show that we knew the house wasn’t perfect, we offered the new tenant $50 per room and $25 per paint can if she wanted to paint on her own. She was thrilled because she planned to paint some rooms to begin with, but now there was a financial incentive for her.

As for rent payments, if the tenant usually pays rent without issue and they preemptively reach out to tell us that they’ll need more time to pay rent, we’ll usually waive the late fee. Our calculations for the year don’t anticipate collecting late fees, so it’s not a loss of ours to waive the fee, but it makes them feel like we care about them as people. If you’re a tenant: communicate regularly with your landlord. Your landlord doesn’t want to evict you, doesn’t want to tarnish your record, and doesn’t want to put you in a position of financial hardship, but we can’t work with you if you don’t communicate with us.

We had a tenant ask us to put in a backsplash in the kitchen. He explained that he cooks regularly, and food is splattering on the wall, which was painted in a flat paint and didn’t wipe well (painted before we owned it). This is unconventional because it’s more than a request to fix a leaking sink or an inoperable appliance. However, we saw the benefit to install a backsplash in the longevity of the kitchen’s life and the tenant feeling like they got a ‘win.’ We agreed to do a peel’n’stick backsplash, which met the goal of a wipeable surface without being labor intensive. We even gave them options to choose from that matched the house’s color scheme. It cost us $68 and about 90 minutes of our time to install it. This tenant still lives in the home, which we’ve owned for nearly 5 years now.

We allow pets in the properties. Back when we were trying to rent an apartment for ourselves to live, few allowed pets; if they allowed pets, there was an astronomic fee associated with it. We decided to not eliminate the average 50% of pet owners by mandating a pet-free property, and we wouldn’t charge monthly pet fees or high initial fees (though we still charge some) associated with having a pet. Honestly, I have kids and a dog; my dog has never done anything wrong in our home, but my kids sure do make a mess and spill things. We have had issues with pets in our properties, but the owners have done other things wrong, so it was a poor tenant issue, not necessarily a pet issue.

I also feel that if we provide a house that looks clean and well-kept, then the tenant is more likely to keep it in that condition. We’re setting the expectation that this is the type of house that we’re renting, and we expect it to be in similar condition when we get it back. We understand paint scuffs happen, pictures get hung, and there may be a couple new stains on carpet, but the house is to be returned to us clean and put together, which is even stated in the lease. If we handed over a house that was dirty or had dingy paint and carpet, the tenant is likely to not put as much effort into keeping it in pristine condition. This isn’t foolproof. But we charge the security deposit for anything outside of normal wear and tear, and they understand this will happen from the lease signing, as well as the unspoken expectation made by the condition we hand the house over in. People are more likely to take care of properties when its condition is good enough to feel pride in, and will typically not respect it if it’s apparent the landlord isn’t taking care of it either.

Property Management

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Property management can be useful and worth the 10% cost, but sometimes it’s not worth having the middle man. Here, I’ll break down our experiences with 3 property managers, but first, the terms of our management agreements. We have three properties in KY under a management company and three properties in VA with a property manager. In VA, we had 5 managed at one point in time, but we sold one property, and another is now managed by us since we knew the tenant and handled all the showings and lease set up.

FEES

Management fee: 10% monthly income. This is standard. If the rent is $900 per month, then you’re paying the management company $90 each month. If the unit isn’t rented, then they get $0.
Leasing fee: 1/2 a month’s rent in KY and $300 per new lease in VA (based on the fee structure of our individual property managers). Standard seems to be one-month’s worth of rent, so we have better fee structure there. In KY, half a month’s rent is about $400. In VA, we rent the houses for more than our KY homes, so half would be more like $500, meaning our $300 fee is a great deal.
Lease renewal fee: $0. We don’t pay either property manager for a renewal. The KY company had 10% of a month’s rent as the renewal fee, but we negotiated out of it. We don’t feel that renewing a lease is outside of the monthly management responsibility.
Maintenance fees: In KY, the agreement template had a 10% markup on all bills paid by the management company. We asked what the monthly management fee covers if not organizing repairs; with no clear answer, the company agreed to remove this fee. However, I have to request the 10% back every time there’s a maintenance fee because their system automatically adds it, and they’re not on top of removing it for our account. Our agreements also include a minimum dollar amount that they can spend on maintenance without our prior approval. This is meant that they can manage small repairs without having to coordinate with us, thereby making the process more efficient.
Unoccupied unit fee: KY also had a $50 per month fee for the months that the unit wasn’t rented. We felt that this disincentivized moving the unit quickly, and we negotiated the removal of this fee.

In all management cases, there’s also a stipulation that the company we sign with has first right of refusal for listing the house for sale.

RESPONSIBILITIES

The property manager is responsible for rent collection, coordinating maintenance calls, move in and move out inspections, distributing notices to the tenant (e.g., late notice), and any legal matters on behalf of us as the owners (which has happened).

VIRGINIA

In Virginia, we have a property manager for a few of our houses. The relationship began because her husband is our home inspector and handyman. Her experience was managing a few higher end properties, and she wasn’t part of a management company, but she is a Realtor. We were buying houses fairly quickly, and we decided it would be worth our time and effort to have someone managing the ones that were further away from our primary residence, mostly to handle the showings.

At first, the property manager would physically collect rent and deposit it into an account we set up just for the rentals. We chose a bank that was near her and us so that it was more convenient. Over the next couple of years, our tenants organically decided they would all pay electronically. We accept rent via Venmo, PayPal, and Zelle. We closed the bank account, since it required a $500 minimum balance, and now only collect rent online.

We’re more hands-on than your typical investor. This agreement allows charges up to $200, but the property manager calls us for everything. Most times, we want the opportunity to fix it ourselves. No reason to pay a plumber $125 for a service call just to replace a toilet flapper. But then 2 kids entered the picture while Mr. ODA works full time, and doing those types of maintenance calls have gone by the wayside. Two hours including driving time, the trip to get supplies, the possibility of multiple trips to resolve the issue, etc. were all reasons that we now rely on maintenance people to handle much of the work.

We learned a lot about the Virginia Code thanks to our property manager and her experience as a Realtor. We also had several filings and appearances in the court system for evictions that she handled on our behalf.

KENTUCKY MANAGEMENT COMPANY #1

Our first house purchase was in Kentucky, while we lived in Virginia. We required a property manager because we didn’t want to spend an indefinite amount of time showing the unit nor handling maintenance issues in a market where we had no connections yet. The first property manager was awful; we picked the company because their rates were the cheapest. We paid for that in the long run.

We had some struggles renting the unit that first go around, but we were told we had an agreement with a tenant for her to move in on April 1st. After a week, we weren’t told that the lease was executed, and when we followed up on it, he said she was coming in the following week to sign for April 15th start. He didn’t acknowledge the difference in what we were originally told. We then had to ask several questions on how we’d receive our rent. It was as if they had never had a property owner expect to see the income monthly. Their expectation, as well as it was defined through emails, was that the money would go into an account they set up, they’d draw down anything needed for management and maintenance, and we may or may not see a ledger. When we asked to be a signatory on the account, they acted surprised that we’d want access to the money. Once we stumbled through account set up, I then had to ask for the statement of expenses month-after-month. There was no automatic process, and it was just when a specific employee got around to writing up the statement.

Then, an intoxicated driver drove into our property. Our property manager was out of town and couldn’t check on the unit. We expected someone else in the company to be able to take over when our specific manager was out of town, and that wasn’t the case. We had Mr. ODA’s family go take pictures of the wreck to ensure we got them ASAP.

After raising our concerns about response time to the property manager’s supervisor, we received this response: On a side note, [manager] has become very busy with his role in the company and taken on a very large property so I think this is attributing to some of his slow response times, although that doesn’t make it right or give him an excuse not to answer your questions. After that, we had several issues with the rental rate and whether it was listed for rent. Then, they didn’t push to uphold the lease, which allows us to enter to show the property with 48 hours notice, which would assist in not having a long turnover period of vacancy. They allowed the tenant to deny access over and over again, and they didn’t even start showing the unit until a week after she vacated it. After several more rounds of confusion about what it should be listed at and their complete inability to communicate with us, the contract was terminated.

The tenant moved out mid-April. We had a new property manager in place in mid-May. A two-year lease was executed for June 1st.

KENTUCKY MANAGEMENT COMPANY #2

This company now manages the townhouse and two new properties we acquired in September 2019. It has not completely been smooth sailing, but communication has been better than the previous company and we haven’t felt forgotten about. As I shared previously, we negotiated out of the 10% markup on invoices in our management agreement. However, their system automatically adds the 10%, so I need to stay on top of the charges to make sure they’re at-cost with no markup.

We’ve had issues with the lease terms meeting what we agreed upon. For example, we charge a one-time pet fee and a pet deposit. We expect to receive the fee as income, but it was put in the security deposit account. With the way it was written in the lease, we can’t access that fee until the tenant moves out now. There were conversations about 18-month leases, but then one lease was only executed for 12 months. Luckily, the tenant was amenable to entering a 6-month extension on her lease.

All in all though, it’s worked well that they handle rent collection and depositing the balance of the rent after their fees in our account each month. While there have been hiccups, it’s been nice to know that they have processes in place and we don’t feel like we’re starting from square-one. Even though we now live in Kentucky, we find their management fees to still be worth the cost and don’t plan to manage these properties on our own at this time.

House #1: Off market purchase

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Our first investment purchase was a townhome in central Kentucky (while living in Virginia) in February 2016.

At this point, we had purchased and sold our first primary residence, and had purchased a new construction home. Our first home sold for $62,500 more than what we purchased it for and we walked away from the sale with over $130,000. Our new home needed about $70k for closing, leaving $60k that we wanted to use for investment properties.

PURCHASING FROM FAMILY

Mr. ODA’s brother-in-law had purchased a foreclosed townhome while he was in college and rented a room out to his friend – excellent forethought and financial decision making there! When him and his wife got married, they were ready to look into a home with more space and less stairs, so we offered to purchase the house. About 2.5 years after he had purchased it, we set him up to make $16,500.

Their Realtor suggested listing at $90-95k. The comparable sales in the area were suggesting 95-100k, but the townhouse in question had a lower PVA than the others recently sold. There was another townhome in the community listed for sale at $100k, but it had been on the market for 4 months at that time, meaning the market wasn’t interested in it at that price. Additionally, this deal was being done off market, which automatically yields a higher net for the seller because there were no Realtor commissions and minimizes the risk of a listing. They didn’t need to get it ‘show ready’ or have to leave the house for an indefinite number of showings. We removed the uncertainty of how long the house would be listed and therefore how many mortgage payments they’d still be paying before it sold. We also eliminated the possibility of an appraisal and home inspection negotiation during the contract period. For all those reasons, we offered $85,000. We settled on $87,000 with $2,000 in seller-paid-closing-costs. A family member, who’s a lawyer, sent us a template for a contract, so we used that as a starting point, and I wrote up our own contract.

We first looked into a loan assumption. We started with several questions regarding how he was paying PMI (whether we’d have to assume the PMI, whether the PMI would be recalculated for the new appraised value based on our purchase, and whether there would be a penalty if we paid down the balance faster to eliminate the PMI), how the loan balance would transfer cleanly, and whether they needed to cash out escrow. After asking all these types of questions, we learned that PNC wouldn’t allow a loan assumption of an FHA loan since our intent was to use it as an investment property.

We did not do our own home inspection. We figured the HOA would cover the exterior, and we reviewed the home inspection he had completed two years prior. There had been a few upgrades since the initial home inspection, and there wasn’t anything that needed our immediate attention. We bought a new washer and dryer since the unit didn’t have any, and I painted most of it before it was listed for rent.

THE LOAN PROCESSING

Both sides of the transaction were able to sign the purchase contract electronically. We went through the whole loan processing without having to visit Kentucky. The attorney shipped the loan documents to us, we invited a notary over to watch us sign the papers, and then we FedEx’d the papers back to the loan officer for the sellers to sign.

While the closing itself went smoothly, we had several issues with our loan provider.

Our loan was a portfolio loan, which means that it’s a loan on the primary market and not backed by Fannie/Freddie. The interest rate was 4.5%; it was amortized over 30 years, but it had a balloon payment after 10 years. We paid careful attention to this loan (e.g., made many, frequent principal payments) because that meant we’d owe over $59k in 10 years.

It was amortized by 365/360 Rule (i.e., by the day) rather than the way it works in a traditional mortgage (annual rate divided by 12). In a traditional mortgage, the principal and interest difference is based on an annual APR, which creates a consistent amortization that gradually reduces the amount of interest in each month’s payment compared to the principal that will be paid. In the 365/360 Rule, each month’s principal and interest applied to the loan is different because it’s based on the number of days in the individual month. For example, in March, we paid February’s 28 days of interest, and in April, we paid March’s 31 days of interest; therefore, more of our March payment was applied to principal.

Here’s a snapshot of the amortization schedule, reflecting the changes of interest and principal by month.

The bank’s system was antiquated in that we could not make online payments unless we had a bank account with their bank. Being that this bank was in Kentucky while we lived in Virginia, we weren’t interested in opening a bank account and funding it just to pay this loan. This meant that all of our payments had to be sent by check to their location for keyed entry. The people responsible for entering these payments were not aware of the principal-only concept, and we spent almost the entire first year of the loan having to call every single time we sent a principal payment to have them reverse it, apply it as principal-only, and credit us the days worth of interest it cost us. After several months of this occurring and the response being that the teller doesn’t know how to enter it (then teach them…), we filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau. We received all the interest owed to us as a result and all future payments were applied correctly.

Due to the poor relationship with the bank and the impending balloon payment, we paid off the loan faster than the 10 years. The loan was issued February 2016, and we made our final payment in April 2020.

PROPERTY MANAGEMENT

We hired a property manager since we were not local and didn’t want to manage showings or maintenance issues in an unknown market. The property management fee is 10% of the monthly income. We actually had several issues with the first property management company, but ‘managing the property manager’ is another post. We released ourselves from that first contract and negotiated with another company, who has been managing the property for the last 4 years.

We have also had to manage the HOA company to address water leaks that stemmed from the brick facade. Both times, the issue presented was eventually resolved, but never in a timely manner. Unfortunately, we are responsible for interior fixes (e.g., drywall) caused by the exterior cracks, which are covered by the HOA since it’s a townhome.

One final interesting story about this house. In November 2016, just a few months after we purchased the house, an intoxicated driver crossed the center line, hopped the curb, drove through the fence, and drove into the back of our townhome, destroying our HVAC unit and taking out a post of the 2nd story deck. It was a Sunday morning. We didn’t pay anything for this incident. The HVAC and a broken light were covered by the insurance company; the deck was repaired by the HOA’s management company. It was an incredible incident.

The townhouse hasn’t been easy to rent. We actually looked into selling it, but our property manager, who is also a Realtor, thought we could only list it at $90,000, which was not something we were interested in, having purchased it at $85k. Once the place is rented, we don’t have issues with maintenance, rent payment, or tenant-related issues. It just takes a month or two of vacancy before we find a qualified applicant. We have offered incentives for leases longer than 12 months to help eliminate our turnover rate and number of days vacant.

PMI – Private Mortgage Insurance

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Don’t pay it. Get creative for your down payment. Here’s a brief on how PMI works and how we avoided paying it.

What is PMI?

A lender typically requires PMI when the loan is greater than 80% of the loan-to-value (LTV) ratio because it’s higher risk for them. If a buyer has less of their own money as equity in the property, the bank views this as a higher probability the homeowner will default on their loan. With that, the PMI is required until the borrower reaches at least 80% for the LTV ratio and the loan is in good standing for at least 5 years. This typically means that a borrower needs 20% of the purchase price as a down payment. There are a few exceptions, but overall, if you don’t have a 20% down payment, you’ll be paying PMI.

PMI can be up to 2% of the loan balance. The lender uses your credit score/history, the down payment amount, and the loan term to evaluate your risk and set the PMI rate.

While there are requirements that the PMI must be removed when your loan hits 78% and 5 years in good standing, you can request the removal of PMI earlier if your house value has risen (e.g., market fluctuation, improvements you made). If you request the removal of PMI, you may be required to pay for the new appraisal, which is an added cost. You should weigh the cost of the appraisal against the remaining payments. In a broad example, if the appraisal costs $450, and your monthly PMI is $120, then as long as you have more than 3 months left before hitting the 78% LTV ratio, it’s worth paying the appraisal fee to have PMI removed. There is also a risk that the appraisal doesn’t come back with a high enough house value, so you should be confident in your home’s value before requesting said action.

How did we avoid paying PMI?

While we were more than qualified to purchase a home in the D.C. suburbs based on our debt-to-income ratio, we restricted ourselves to what we could afford as the down payment.

A bank qualifies you based on your debt-to-income ratio. If you have low recurring monthly bills, then you’re qualified for a larger loan. At the time, our only recurring monthly payment was on my vehicle, at about $350/month. The bank pre-qualified us for about $700,000. Sure, we could “afford” a monthly payment on a $700,000 mortgage, but then we couldn’t eat, sit on furniture, or do anything else. 😉 We’d also be paying PMI because we didn’t have 20%, or $140,000, to put down.

Also due to our low debt-to-income ratio, we couldn’t qualify for any programs that would allow anything less than a 20% down payment for a mortgage. We set our purchase limit at $350,000, which meant we would need $70,000 for the down payment, plus closing costs. Due to the limited inventory at that price in the DC suburbs and the knowledge that we were pre-qualified for double what we were searching for, our Realtor kept pushing us to raise our purchase price. However, we advocated for ourselves and kept our focus on what we could afford as our down payment so we wouldn’t pay PMI. After months of searching and seeing places that were literally missing floors and walls, we increased our search to $400,000, hoping that if we found something in the 350k-400k range, we could negotiate it to 350k.

Our move to the D.C. area was not in our original plans. Mr. ODA had been saving through high school and college, expecting to buy a house in a lower cost of living locality. When we moved to D.C., we knew that we would need to change our expectations and day-to-day actions. We rented an apartment in Fairfax, but we didn’t want to be putting over $1600 per month towards rent for long, and we’d prefer to be paying towards a mortgage and building equity in a home. Positives to owning a home: mortgage tax deduction, appreciation, and the equity building that you get back when you sell the home.

While we rented, we were conscious of our spending. We aimed to spend less than $10 per day on food between the two of us, and we limited how much we ate out. We did activities with Groupons or restaurant.com coupons.

We moved to DC in December, and over the summer, we put an offer on a flipped foreclosure. The listing was $384,900; our offer was $380,000 with $2,000 in closing costs. It was denied by the bank, as we were told we were the 2nd best offer of 3. The next day, we got a call that the bank countered our offer. Apparently, the first offer attempted to negotiate their offer further, and the bank moved on to us. They countered $380,000 with no closing costs; we accepted. We now had to scrounge up about $80k for closing. 

We looked into a Thrift Savings Plan (Federal government’s 401k) loan. Many warned us against the idea, but our research showed it wasn’t as much of a concern as others let on. The details of this loan option are on another blog post. We decided to each take a residential loan from our accounts. I took a $15,000 loan and Mr. ODA took a $25,000 loan. We also borrowed $5,000 from Mr. ODA’s parents and paid it back within a couple of months. We avoided PMI.

An argument heard about not owning a home is that it costs a lot to maintain a home. While owning the home for 3.5 years, we gutted the main floor bathroom ($4,000), replaced the AC ($3,600), replaced the hot water heater ($1,100), resolved termite issues with treatment and wall replacements ($2,000), laid carpet in the basement living area, improved the yard through grass maintenance and purchased a shed, and painted a few rooms. We sold the home for over $60,000 more than we purchased it for (tax free since it was our primary residence the whole time), far more than the minimal expenses we put into it.

Key takeaways from our experience:

  • The efforts we put in to avoid paying PMI meant we had another $100-200 in our pockets per month. Instead of padding the bank’s ‘pockets,’ we paid ourselves back with interest into our retirement account.
  • We lived below our means, saved, and kept focus on the big picture.
  • We pushed ourselves to our financial limits to begin building equity in a home, rather than paying rent to a landlord (or in our case, an apartment company). The efforts put in that year have paid off time and time again, starting with selling the home 3.5 years later for a profit that led to some of our first rental purchases.

House #8

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I shared that I would tell the stories of our home purchases. Instead of starting with #1, I decided to start with the most interesting. This property was being sold by a licensed Realtor, so we had a false sense of security. It ended up being the sketchiest (technical term) deal we’ve done. This is in Virginia.

We started with a home inspection, which revealed several issues. We requested the HVAC condensate line be cleared and the water in the backup pan removed. We also agreed to have our attorney withhold $1,300 at closing, to be paid to a contractor of our choice after closing, to repair other items found during the inspection. I can’t remember why we were handling the home inspection items, but that should have been the first red flag.

Our closing was scheduled for 8/18.

We were told that the HVAC repairs agreed upon were completed. We went to check on the progress of cleaning out the house and the HVAC repairs on August 10th. The HVAC’s backup pan still had water in it, and the house was filthy (after being told it was ‘vacant’ and ‘cleaned’). Plus, the electric was turned off. We had our Realtor reach out to the seller to cover our bases. Here’s his email:

While waiting for a response on this email, we checked with our closing attorney to ensure everything else was ready for closing; it wasn’t. We fully expected a “we’re clear” response, but instead we were told they were having trouble clearing the title. We weren’t given the specifics, but that’s not what you want to hear a week before closing. It ended up being cleared, but that was one more thing to worry about!

As typical, we had to do a final walk-through of the house to ensure it’s in the same condition (or better) as it was when we went under contract. Knowing how poorly the seller communicated over the previous month, we wanted to see the house the day before closing, rather than right before we head to the closing table. The electric was still not turned on, and it wasn’t cleaned. Our Realtor contacted the seller again. We were assured it would be addressed, and the electric would be on. We made plans to walk through the house in the morning.

Our Realtor was unavailable that morning, since this wasn’t supposed to be part of the schedule, so he sent a team-member to let us in. As luck would have it, she dropped the lockbox key below the front porch, so we couldn’t get in. We called our attorney and postponed the closing to later in the day. The Realtor was able to obtain a copy of the key to let us in, where we learned the electric was still off.

I contacted the electric company. I explained that I was the buyer, and the seller kept saying the electric would get turned on, but here we are at the 11th hour with nothing. The woman on the other end couldn’t tell me what she was seeing since it wasn’t my account, but she carefully played with words to let me know: sorry, hunny, but there’s no way this electric is getting turned on while under this person’s name because there is a high outstanding balance. She assured me that if I put it in my name, there wouldn’t be any issues. However, I wasn’t about to pay fees and put it in my name before the house was legally mine.

This is where we learned that a good attorney is worth his weight in gold. We never really understood the role of a closing attorney, since all our closings had gone smoothly (I mean, we could sign all the closing documents in about 20 minutes at this point). Since the electric wasn’t on, and we couldn’t verify the condition of the home, as required by the contract, our attorney withheld $5,000 of the settlement proceeds. The seller’s attorney was NOT happy, but it was entertaining to watch from our standpoint. 

We had been provided a ‘receipt,’ dated 8/17 (the day before closing), that indicated an HVAC repair man had been out to do the work required. We are pretty sure that this was falsified. There was no electricity in the house that day, and there was still water in the pan on 8/18. Here’s the email I sent to our attorney releasing the $5,000 withheld, less the cost of my HVAC technician performing the repairs.

It cost me $125 for the HVAC technician’s trip. Our attorney told the seller’s attorney that he would release the $5000 less the $125. The seller’s attorney said he didn’t have any authority to allow that; so our attorney said he didn’t have any authority to release the $5000. Well, the seller’s attorney decided $4875 was better than nothing, and I got my $125 back.

All in all, everything fell into place, but there were many days and hours that felt like we were about to fall into a pit.

We purchased the house for $89,000, plus the $1,300 for contractor repairs, and the seller paid $2,000 of our closing costs (this minimizes the amount we have to bring to closing and allows us to leverage every last dollar we can for maximum efficiency). Our first lease was for $995/month, exceeding the 1% Rule. We closing in mid-August, and the first lease didn’t execute until October 1, which was one of our longer vacancies. That tenant renewed her lease once. Currently, the rent is $1,025/month. We sought $1,050 for a 12 month lease, and the prospective tenant negotiated an 18-month lease at $1,025. We accepted this because it was rented in October, and an 18-month lease brought as back to spring-time turnover. Even though taxes have risen since the purchase, we still maintain the substantial cash-on-cash return that is provided for in trying to obtain the 1% rule on investment real estate purchases.

After closing, I painted nearly the entire house (including the trim) over the course of a week; the house looked significantly better with just a fresh coat of paint. We also had to do a more thorough cleaning job than we’ve typically had to do on houses we purchase, including caulking the tub and cleaning the carpet.

We replaced the dishwasher with the first tenant, and then replaced the refrigerator after the second tenant kept complaining about the seal not working well. Most costly, the house has had several roof and siding issues. The kitchen was an addition with a flat roof, which typically causes problems. We replaced the gutters, fixed the flashing, repaired some siding, and then eventually replaced that part of the roof altogether. We also had to replace a cracked window, which was surprisingly under warranty. It took a lot of work to find the window manufacturer and a local distributor, but it surprisingly all worked out because it was a stress fracture and covered under a lifetime warranty.

Leveraging Money – Mortgage is not an ‘Eight Letter’ Word

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Dave Ramsey has convinced (too many) people to pay off their mortgage and be “debt free.” Then you have Robert Kiyosaki telling people not to buy a house because its a liability, but never seems to address that you still have to pay for a roof over your head somehow. We subscribe to a different view – make your money work for you. There are certain types of debt that could truly benefit you, and a mortgage is one of those.

If we worried about paying down our mortgage, we wouldn’t have near the savings and investments we do, and wouldn’t be able to establish enough rental income to replace Mrs. ODA’s income, and being well on our way to replacing Mr. ODA’s. 

We lived below our means, took some loans, and bought a house in one of the more expensive regions of the country – DC suburbs (oh, and while paying for a wedding). We knew we’d have no trouble qualifying for a mortgage and paying the monthly payment, but we didn’t want to pay Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI), which meant coming up with 20% to put down (i.e., about $80,000). In fact, we were pre-qualified for double the purchase price of a house than we were comfortable with because we were more focused on our down payment threshold than what we could support as a monthly payment (which is how a bank will pre-qualify you based on your other monthly debt payments).

Our first, expensive, little house that jumpstarted our investing before we even knew

Our primary goal to enhance our savings in the months leading up to the house purchase was to keep the cost of our daily food intake below $10 between the two of us. We were cautious with how we spent money on groceries, whether we ate out (meaning no buying lunch during the work day), and the types of activities we did. While most of our meals consisted of macaroni and cheese and pb&j, we did ‘splurge’ a little more once in a while (read splurge as meaning “2 for $20” at Applebee’s, not steak dinners). That year of actively watching what we spent paid off in ways we wouldn’t know down the road.

Three and a half years later, we sold our house for a $60,000 profit and purchased a home in the Richmond area for less than what that first house cost us when we bought it. That left a substantial balance in our savings account that needed to get to work. 

We’re not interested in preparing for doomsday. In an emergency, there’s hardly anything that can’t be put on a credit card. If we can’t pay off the credit card, we have money in the stock market that can be liquidated within 24 hours to pay it. This perspective is particularly possible because we live a lifestyle that allows for a high savings rate while Mr. ODA is still W-2 employed, which means we’re even more unlikely to need stock liquidation to cover expenses. We weigh the risk of a possible emergency against not having our money make more money, which gives us the ability to live less conservatively. Since we’re not interested in maintaining 3x our monthly income in a savings account at 0.01% interest rate, the next option to discuss is paying down our primary residence mortgage. 

Our mortgage rate was 2.875%, a very cheap lending rate [this was a 5-year Adjustable Rate Mortgage (ARM), a topic we can discuss in a future post on weighing mortgage options]. The question we had to ask was whether paying down the mortgage at a low interest rate was more beneficial than the income we could bring in with a rental property. If we paid more than 20% for our new primary residence’s down payment, was that going to provide us a greater cash flow to leave our careers before typical retirement age? 

No, it wouldn’t allow us to leave our careers. So, we put the balance of money from the sale of our first home into the stock market and investment properties to make it generate income instead. 

Our first investment property purchase was in February 2016. Since then, we’ve purchased twelve other investment properties, with the most recent two being in September 2019. Mrs. ODA’s income was replaced by our rental property cashflow by the time our son was born in August 2018; that’s within 2.5 years after we purchased our first investment property. 

Of our 12 investment properties, two have mortgages paid off. First, there’s a maximum of 10 mortgages you can have when lending under Fannie Mae. There are ways around this in theory, but that’s another post. One of the mortgages we paid off because it had a balloon payment coming due. Another mortgage was paid off because it had a low balance and was one of the higher interest rates among our properties. Currently, we’re working to pay down two other mortgages due to their relatively high interest rates (5.1% and 4.95%), and each have a balance around $26,000 now. We’re choosing to pay down mortgages in this season instead of purchase new rental properties because we are not finding properties in decent condition that meet the 1% Rule. Plus, not having a mortgage on a property immediately increases your cash flow if you want to live off that monthly income rather than W-2 employment. 

Had we chosen to pay down our primary residence mortgage instead of leverage our funds through mortgages, we’d still have a mortgage payment of over $1,500 per month and no other income strings. Instead, we still have a mortgage payment for our primary home, but we also have the cash flow that replaced Mrs. ODA’s six-figure income.

Choosing Properties

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Choosing Properties

Mr. ODA has regular emails come in with new listings in the areas we’re interested in. While some of our houses are 2 bedroom, we find it easier to rent 3 bedroom houses. We also are looking to the possibility of resale, which is better for the 3 and 4 bedroom houses.

First, we look at the condition of the property. We’re interested in properties that can be immediately rented, meaning we’re not looking for remodel projects. Most of our properties purchased required no work to prepare it for a renter, and they are typically recently updated. When I say these houses were recently updated, they weren’t top-of-the-line finishes.  Here’s an example of one we purchase 4 years ago, and the pink knobs are still there!

There are a few properties that took slightly more work. We purchased one property that required a whole-house paint job (including trim work) that took a week doing it myself. We also attempted to rent another property with old carpet on the main floor. The potential renter asked if we’d be willing replace it or refinish the floors; we ended up taking a week to refinish the floors, which has paid off in the long run.

Typically, we’re going to replace appliances, paint, and scrub the place down to prepare it for renting. We’re not looking to overhaul the building or do massive capital improvements for that first renter. However, I’ll note that it doesn’t mean we don’t eventually do that. Just this past year, we had several roof replacements/repairs, plumbing replacements, and HVAC repairs.

We want the house to be in good condition to keep a renter there (we’ve actually had very low turnover), make it easy to re-rent it when there is a vacancy, and to make it attractive for any future sale. We’ve noticed that homes that were typically owned instead of rented are in better condition than if it was managed by a landlord. We seem to struggle wanting to move forward with houses that are currently rented because of all the deferred maintenance.

We have been under contract on multiple houses that we walked away from after the home inspection (e.g., knob-and-tube wiring, vertical clearance requirements on stairs, remnants of a previous fire found, poor patch work). Don’t feel like you’re in too deep if the inspection comes back to show a lot of improvements are necessary. It’s a hard mentality to talk yourself (and your partner) through because you’ve spent time looking at the house, reviewing rental comps, possibly reviewing current lease agreements, and spent the money and time for the home inspection. But keep in mind that it’s not worth purchasing the house and spending more than you’d like to keep the house standing and rentable.

Then, in broad strokes, we’re watching the 1% Rule. This means the monthly rent should be 1% of the purchase price (e.g., a purchase of $100,000 house should yield $1,000 per month in rent). Review current rent prices in the immediate vicinity. We’ve purchased houses in areas that have several rental properties, so it’s been fairly easy to identify a rate based on the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, as well as the amenities we can offer (e.g., appliances, lease term, parking availability). In future posts, I’ll provide the details of each of our purchases.  

Here’s a break-down of our current properties related to the 1% Rule. 

You can see that we didn’t hit the 1% on 5 of them. The first had a tenant when we purchased it 4 years ago; we’ve risen the rent once and plan to raise it to $1200 at the renewal term in July (so raised the rent $50 every two years). The bottom two were in a market that we were unfamiliar with, and even though we thought we would yield $990 easily for rent (yes, is still below 1%), the houses were in excellent condition, so we looked to the future value in the decision making. Unfortunately, we didn’t close on these until September, which is difficult to find renters. We didn’t have many showings at ~$1,000 rent. We ended up lowering the rental price by offering an 18-month lease so that the future rental timeframe was in the spring, and we offered the rest of October as free.

Mr. ODA developed a spreadsheet to calculate all the costs associated with owning the house, which helps determine whether the house fits our portfolio goals, especially if it doesn’t exactly meet the 1% Rule. This spreadsheet makes assumptions for routine maintenance costs, capital improvement costs, vacancy assumptions, insurance, mortgage interest, etc. Calculate the monthly rent less than the monthly cost of each of these assumptions to arrive at the monthly cash flow. Annualize the monthly cash flow, and then divide it by the down payment and closing costs to arrive at a ‘cash-on-cash’ return, which we’re looking to be at least 8-10%.

Next, we examine the neighborhood. We have thresholds for prospective tenants, which typically yields to a middle-of-the-road neighborhood. We’re not looking for a perfect, upscale neighborhood to own a rental because these types of homes rarely meet the 1% Rule. I utilize Trulia to examine the crime rates of the area. We want to offer homes that are in reasonable city locations.

I had fully vetted one house and determined it was worth our purchase. A similar house, with an upgraded kitchen, was for sale a couple of blocks away. I assumed it was the same neighborhood and didn’t do my due diligence. The house showed very well online, and we had several showings from qualified individuals, but then they’d check the house details, only to find out that it was in a high crime zone. We ended up having to lower our credit score threshold to find a renter (compensating with additional security deposit), then had difficulties for over a year collecting her rent, which really should have been expected. We have since sold off that property. 

If all these steps, including the cash-on-cash evaluation, should take about an hour. If we get this far, we go see the house. If the house is in the condition we expect it to be based on the pictures, we make an offer. Our Realtor will write up that offer the same day. Recently, many houses have been in a multiple-offer scenario. This is another trap to not get sucked into. After so much time vetting the house, it’s easy to be attached, especially if you find very favorable data (e.g., you can get rent higher than 1%). It’s not worth owning the house if you have to purchase it at a higher price than you’re comfortable at; it must be a business decision, purely based on the financials.

Keep an eye on listings daily or weekly to keep a pulse on the neighborhoods you’re interested in, evaluate the property condition, consider the 1% Rule and evaluate the detailed financial cash flow, don’t skip the home inspection nor should you ignore the results of it, and keep it a business (not emotional) decision.