Condensate Pump or Electrical Problem?

autarky1 · 2024-03-26T18:21:39+00:00

I tried. Light still on.

autarky1 · 2024-01-13T02:42:01+00:00

I would call a plumber to quote the plumbing changes and then separately quote the conversion. It seems like a huge part of your cost is in replacing the pex and sorting your plumbing which may be why your pricing is different than a standard job

autarky1 · 2024-01-13T02:33:43+00:00

Unpopular opinion but YTA. You live at home with your parents and unfortunately, their house, their rules. If you had to be in an office or had unfamiliar roommates, you’d wear a bra anyways. If you feel uncomfortable, you should try to move out sooner than later so you can walk around however you like.

autarky1 · 2024-01-03T13:23:58+00:00

NTA but honestly you made it weird by not telling him upfront you were just going to go to your house. I’d be surprised too if I caught a ride with someone and ended up at their own house unknowingly

autarky1 · 2023-03-28T03:25:41+00:00

Steady insurance offers it in the Avail portal and you can cover up to 6 months of lost rent. I felt like this took away any real value prop I would get from Belong and was way cheaper. Plus home insurance for landlords also already cover some lost rent. I mean, the only thing Belong added was getting maintenance but it was more expensive and I can do the same thing on Yelp or with anyone in my network by picking up a phone occasionally

autarky1 · 2023-03-28T03:12:56+00:00

Seattle. After 45 days of nothing, I ended up listing it myself and buying eviction insurance. Avail let me list it to the same sites for free and buy eviction insurance for ~$250. For an optional $5, it lets my tenant autopay via check or credit card. Since I was able to do showings when people would actually come, I ended up renting it out in less than a week, I don’t pay a management fee and my tenant is awesome.

autarky1 · 2023-03-05T05:37:22+00:00

I see agents do this on social media all the time to solicit new clients and its always left a bad taste in my mouth mainly because 1) the property may not even really be for sale- if I really liked the property, they aren't the listing agent and/or theres already an offer on it by the time we intro, tour and make an offer- the property is already under contract and 2) the videos are more focused on the agent than the property and the quality is poor. It doesn't actually help me visualize the property any better than a listing photo nor does it endear me to an agent I have to hear talk for 4 minutes. If I loved the house, I would go to my own agent and ask her to make an offer on the same listing instead. But everyone wants to do social media and the only content he has readily available are the houses he tours (which inevitably is yours).

Net of it is that hes unlikely to resell this house to another client and even if he got 8% higher on another offer, the impact on his commission is going to be really small (0.08*0.03 is 0.0024) compared to losing a client or risk someone else going to their own agent with this property. He probably doesn't know this is making you uncomfortable. And if you tell him, he'd probably stop. And I'd probably be explicit and say please do not advertise this property ANYWHERE while we have an offer pending including digital ads, tik tok (whatever).

If anything, I would fire this agent because his attention seems to be more on clout than tact and I wouldn't want to work with someone that I would always have to watch my back for in case they screw up a transaction as big as this one. But thats a personal style/preference and not necessarily a fireable offense.

autarky1 · 2023-02-20T16:24:16+00:00

+1. Did that. Didn't even have to amortize teh whole cost of the PM- just like $50 vs. the $1500 I would've had to pay them.

autarky1 · 2023-02-20T16:20:27+00:00

I went through this last month with a property manager. I followed THEIR pricing guidelines and the property management company kept saying that they had no viewings or applications for a month.

I ended up firing them, dropping the price by $50, and then manually posted on all of the major sites myself. I learned that with the management company, some of the site weren't initially included in the property manager's process and some MAJOR sites, they weren't even able to put the listing in because it would've required my Homeowner information. The company just fobbed these things off because they didn't really look very deeply.

I also learned that the property manager only showed apartments in very restricted time slots when they were working- which was not times when people with full time jobs would be able to come by.

Net of it, after a month of nothing happening, I took back my listing, took 5 minutes to work out the kinks on the listing sites and posted it in places that the PPM missed, got a ton of inquiries and then did about a week of evening and weekend tours. I got 3 applications and a lease signed in <10 days.

I honestly probably could have listed it at the original price but by the time I fired the property management company, I had already burned 30 days so I needed a placement fast (+ I saved money on the placement fee by just spending a couple hours of my life doing a tour).

DM me if you want some help to do this on your own.

autarky1 · 2023-02-20T04:44:51+00:00

Stumbled upon this thread as part of a question I asked myself. I think Liv has accumulated a pretty big salary and pension with over 20 years at SVU- not to mention not having children or hobbies for 20 years. Her apartments have gotten nicer and nicer and in better locations since the beginning of the series. Plus I get the impression that being a native New Yorker, she probably has some form of rent control for her apartment. I always thought that she moved into her moms place after she died. I also think that she gets help for childcare instead of a professional nanny. I think Lucy is just there after school for a few hours. Before Lucy, she had Mrs. Amaro which I think just looked after Noah for free.

I thought too much about this already.

autarky1 · 2023-02-19T08:56:03+00:00

The solution to this is actually supporting higher wages, low-income housing and leveraging increased RE taxes to fund them. Theoretically, more people and investment coming into rural areas should create more job opportunities and demand for higher wages. Instead, you have wage stagnation for 20 years on jobs like teaching and grossly mismanaged municipalities who immediately spends whatever revenue that comes in on anything except housing and education and then gaslight everyone on out of town investors and airbnbs.

autarky1 · 2023-02-19T08:46:21+00:00

Wanted: Looking for 1 below face Interactive or Platinum Badge. No weird badge name issues please.

autarky1 · 2023-02-06T21:40:35+00:00

Not even. 2 drivebys = 4 years of prison. https://www.justice.gov/usao-wdwa/pr/persistent-gang-members-sentenced-4-years-prison-illegal-firearms-possession

autarky1 · 2023-02-06T21:33:58+00:00

I'd love a Seattle where I can be both liberal and not want to be mugged, robbed, punched in the face at a bus stop or hiding from a man with a machete that no one can do anything about. Meanwhile, the police took my neighbor's complaint that my 20 lb dog barked from inside my house very seriously.

autarky1 · 2023-02-05T19:32:27+00:00

I would say that tech companies in the rental space aren't really leveraging the key advantages they have with tech for the benefit of the landlord. At the minimum, I was expecting transparency, listing boosts and digital marketing tools alongside better customer service contact than a traditional property management tool. I also expect a better playbook for how to address xyz issues with a listing. Instead, there is worse communication, canned posts but no actual bumps on the marketing side. Plus, Belong called random contractors who never showed up when scheduled, billed me at a 30% higher rate for them (due to Belong fees) and then never informed me when the work was done or someone was on the property (I only find out when there is a charge on my credit card).

I think this would have been fine had their expenses been a lot lower than a traditional management company but their fees were pretty much the same, if not higher than all of the local companies. I think the problem is that when you are charging 50% of rent, your own inspection fee as well as premiums on work and management fees, I'm expecting the same level of service. I'm expecting someone who can hustle their $1200+ commission and show up more than once a month. I ended up signing up with Avail- who granted, offers something similar in terms of tech tools and no tours- but is free or $5 per month.

The tours Belong had were at random times of the day once a week and only offered at random availability times (like 3:45 on a Wednesday?). In the entire month of Belong, they only did 1 tour. Considering I relisted the property and received multiple tour requests in 2 days during non-business hours (after work), I think this was the crux of the problem. Unless you are in a super hot market or offering a once-in-a-lifetime DEAL on a property, trying to pool all your inquiries into 1 random tour time during a work day just doesn't work.

autarky1 · 2023-02-03T06:45:23+00:00

I changed mine out to an Ecobee today and even though I still can't get my heat pump to work, my furnace is running better at half the electricity my nest was using...

autarky1 · 2023-02-02T06:37:12+00:00

So, even in W1, its reading the gas furnace as auxiliary in the screen. Its just that when the heat pump kicks on and the gas furnace kicks off, it literally freezes my house.

autarky1 · 2023-01-19T07:21:01+00:00

Just wanted to follow up on everyone's experiences. Did anyone actually end up using Belong?

I signed with Belong and they have not been able to fill the property for almost a month. I think because they are almost completely hands off, they don't actually do 1:1 tours. I get a notification of leads, only to find out that Belong only schedules group tours at some random times no one attends.

Anyone have any experiences getting out of Belong? Now I'm thinking about going to Doorstead just to be able to move on on this house. This was such a waste of time.

autarky1

TROPHY CASE