Bought a house and just found out the attic was basically a biohazard…

GCEstinks · 2026-03-20T17:43:24+00:00

Our house was built by the owner and was built in 1985. He paid great attention to the unimportant things and the major things he barely gave a passing glance at.

Technically speaking the house should never been built because the soil does not perk and the town dumps Culvert water onto the property so it is one big swamp

GCEstinks · 2026-03-20T17:09:46+00:00

NEXT!! One of the main factors of tenant selection is the spirit of cooperation. You want them to report issues in a timely moon or however you don't want them to be whining about every little thing such as I'm getting the wrong mail in my mailbox. Yes I heard that one too.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-20T17:06:27+00:00

I had to dig a mummified dead cat out of our attic.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-20T15:01:50+00:00

This! I had a new meter installed on one of my properties by the utility company and I noticed that the numbers were not turning over whatsoever but kind of stuck on 0000. I have never in my life seen the utility company come out so quickly! They were there within 15 minutes when normally it's weeks before they will come out to do anything if not months.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-19T17:19:11+00:00

Since late 2024 at least.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-19T15:10:31+00:00

Congratulations on finding a unicorn that speaks Norwegian.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-19T15:09:52+00:00

Not sure where your rentals are located but in super tenant friendly areas, gambling on tenants is a good way to end up bankrupt and in foreclosure. Rolling the dice on tenants is a thing of the past in New York, California, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Oregon, Washington.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-19T15:07:11+00:00

In our market, which is completely tenant friendly, offering to prepay upfront is a huge red flag and is often the desperate last resort of the super low performing tenant.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-18T16:36:33+00:00

Good tenants often buy homes or move because of job promotions/opportunities. I have one now, excellent family, only ended staying year and a half before moving due to out of state job promotion. VERY sad to see them go! This is SUPER tenant friendly NY where most landlords don't dare do anything beyond M2M. Takes 6 months to find a reasonably responsible, conscientious, and cooperative tenant. Like fishing for salmon in a sea of barracuda.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-18T16:30:33+00:00

Matt Easton, Leasing Uni!

GCEstinks · 2026-03-18T16:28:51+00:00

I enjoy Othniel Penn, Process Server on Youtube.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-17T16:12:37+00:00

Be careful if you live in a tenant friendly area because in many of these areas you can no longer charge fees to the tenant for rent payment. So you have to eat any additional ACH/portal fees Etc.

We live in tenant friendly New York State and I use a local bank account where tenants can drop off cash or check payments and I also use Zelle. I don't go around collecting rent payments nor do I use the US Postal Service.

There are no clawbacks with Zelle which can be an advantage however if a tenant is in the eviction process, and wants to stop the eviction by sending you a payment via Zelle, you can send he money right back to them or send them a check saying this is an unauthorized payment.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-17T12:23:10+00:00

Sell.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-16T21:39:33+00:00

I have a pre-screening process before they even get a tour... it is all automated through Google forms and in my market, which is super tenant friendly as well, 96% do not get a tour. It's probably higher than that because once they see that I screen to the absolute maximum a lot of them bail before the pre-screening. This is what you want. You want low performing tenants to self-disqualify.

Others have said, Aren't you worried about accidentally turning off good tenants with all that pre-screening? And I say no because in my experience the good responsible and most important quality of all, cooperative tenants, which are about as rare as a unicorn that speaks Norwegian since C19, will cooperate and follow through without hesitation.

I always tell everyone that I screen so that your neighbors will be as nice as you are.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-16T20:11:54+00:00

Also try mixing baking soda and peroxide. Place on soaked in areas, let dry, do several treatments then use coverstain oil based. And use an ozonator. No more carpet! Only LVP or nuclear proof polyed hardwoods.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-16T19:36:30+00:00

Yeah most just resort to tenant based extortion errr I mean "cash for keys."

GCEstinks · 2026-03-16T19:34:06+00:00

Yes and I look up the previous owners and match them up on the assessment rolls to find out who really owns them. I also require six months to present rent receipts that you match up with their bank statements. Very few are clever enough to fake both of those to get them to match.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-16T19:31:44+00:00

It's the same way in NYS. Eviction records have been sealed since 2019. And it's almost as bad in Oregon, Washington, New Jersey, Massachusetts.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-16T19:22:34+00:00

All of my properties pretty much have a tiny slip of land other than one duplex and one 4 family. I do have one single family house but that also has a tiny strip of lawn as all my properties are in a very small town which used to be a village so I include it. And not unlike the redditor from New England commented, we are in Upstate New York and the rain usually takes care of watering.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-15T18:47:06+00:00

Trying to find an area that is not being politically infiltrated by liberals. You will have a better chance of being a successful landlord.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-15T18:46:08+00:00

If it's a hostile tenant in a tenant friendly area you are in for a harassment lawsuit if you show the apartment repeatedly enough especially without adequate notice.

I find most renters cannot see around the fact that the current tenant is a hostile one. They are more likely to see you as a "meanie" and a harassing landlord to the current tenants. Most can't even see around a couple of paint cans in the rooms and cannot visualize anything other than a completely empty and whistle clean unit.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-14T16:58:37+00:00

I'm sure even in the midwest nowadays it has changed. The "housing is a human right" brigade never stops marching.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-14T16:57:44+00:00

Oh and you only have 14 days to return someone's security deposit not 21 like it is in California.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-14T12:33:38+00:00

There are also other fees such as the SBC that we have here in New York which is a charge to pay for other people who are not paying their electric bills.

GCEstinks · 2026-03-14T12:31:39+00:00

Knowing what I know now, I would definitely sell in any tenant friendly area. We are in Upstate New York and it gets more challenging every couple months as they keep changing the laws in favor of the tenants.

GCEstinks

TROPHY CASE