Investor questions: property management, lease agreements, all-cash offers and more

Tune in for today's episode where Michael and Lori answer questions that we have received from listeners and members of the Roofstock Academy. We cover questions on property management, appraisals on all cash offers, editing lease agreements, wire transfers on EMDs, insurance assumptions, and renter’s insurance. Please submit your questions as comments on YouTube for the next round! --- Transcript   Before we jump into the episode, here's a quick disclaimer about our content. The Remote Real Estate Investor podcast is for informational purposes only, and is not intended as investment advice. The views, opinions and strategies of both the hosts and the guests are their own and should not be considered as guidance from Roofstock. Make sure to always run your own numbers, make your own independent decisions and seek investment advice from licensed professionals.   Pierre: Hey, everyone, and welcome to the Remote Real Estate Investor Podcast. Today I'm joined by Michael Albaum and it is my distinct honor and pleasure to welcome Lori Ruddle. Lori, welcome to the podcast for the first time.   Lori: Thank you.   Pierre: Do you want to give a brief introduction for yourself?   Lori: Let's see right now, I am the Roofstock membership concierge and also one of the coaches.   Michael: Yeah, you are!   Pierre: Today we're going to be tackling some more questions that we got from members of the Roofstock Academy and also some listener submitted questions. So let's hop right into it.   All right, so let's jump right into the questions. So I'll just pitch these out to you and whoever's excited about responding to the question, feel free to pipe in.   Michael: Let's do it.   Pierre: First one here. Can you have a property manager, only qualified tenants?   Michael: Ooh, Lori… You are all over this!   Lori: Yes, I will do my best! You have the ability to do like have them do everything that they would normally do or you can piecemeal it out and do everything ala carte. So you prefer to do the screening, which is very uncommon, but perhaps you prefer to do the screening and then you can do the screening and have them handle the month to month. So like collection of rents, all those different kinds of things, so you can definitely piecemeal it out.   Michael: And then if you because I've had this question come up to if you wanted someone to only do the leasing piece of it, do you think that most property managers are open to doing that, like with a leasing agent, and then you do the actual management yourself?   Lori: It depends upon the location, like some location, you know, it depends on where you're located, because some locations, some areas have a higher percentage of you know, leasing done by realtors and others have a higher percentage that are done by property managers. So it really kind of depends upon where you're located. Like in my area, it's not very common for realtors to do leasing, so…   Michael: Yep, yeah, same for me. I was super surprised to learn that that was like something that Realtors did. I was totally foreign to me.   Lori: Yeah, so it depends.   Michael: Yeah. Okay, so I guess kind of, like so many things, ask reach out to the property manager, ask them? Is that something that they're open to and what the fee structure would look like if they are?   Lori: Yeah, and definitely check with the realtor that you've been using, if you're using one in that area, because maybe it's cheaper, maybe they do it one off, you just never know, it's just good to kind of find out which way is going to work better for you.   Michael: Yeah, super good point and even to that point, I love working and I've chatted with a lot of people about this in the academy. But I love working with agents who are also property managers, or vice versa. Because I always say you date your agent, and you marry your property manager and so if your agent sells you a crummy deal, they're off to the next transaction, you might never hear or see them again, but a property manager there with you for the long haul, assuming it's a good working relationship and so having an agent that also spotted manager, they're not going to want to sell you their own headache and something that I've also encountered is if they are if they do wear both hats, asking the property manager, hey, what is your leasing fee look like if I buy through you. So I actually worked with a couple property managers that didn't charge me a tenant placement fee, because I bought the property through them. So there could be some additional added benefits you can stack on just by using the same folks and personnel.   Lori: For sure and it's also you know, if you are utilizing a property manager or leasing or realtor, depending upon, you know, it may be more cost effective for you to do all of it versus just take out one small piece of it. So depending upon the pricing structure.   Michael: Super great point. So hopefully that was a very long winded way of getting to a semblance of an answer but great question.   Pierre: Let's stretch out that wind a little longer, I have one more…   Michael: Yeah, let's do it!   Pierre: A nugget to drop on there. Yeah, I know. We're we can't make recommendations of who you go to on this the show in particular, but you can look up this property management light companies as well, that allow you that provide exactly this service. So we've had a property manager on the show before that, that showed their product, which is very much like this. It's very minimal fees, and you could employ them to the degree that you want them involved in your property.   Michael: Yeah, yeah. Since you were appointed yeah, those companies it's kind of tech enabled companies are coming becoming more popular seemingly to for the ala carte style.   Pierre: Exactly.   Michael: Sweet.   Pierre: I consider that sufficiently answered…   Michael: Closed, signed, sealed onto the next one.   Pierre: All right, next one here. Can you add or change verbiage in a lease?   Michael: Oh Lori, this is your this is right up your alley too.   Lori: Yeah, this is right up my alley! Yeah. 100%. Um, they usually property managers, or if it's the realtor, they have, like a pre canned version that they use. But, you know, usually it's best to say, okay, have you included something about this or about that something that's important to you and usually, it's covered in the leases that they have but if not, you can absolutely added it.   Michael: So Lori, question for your pop fire question. Yeah, I had a really bad experience with a tenant. They trashed the house on the way out and so I want a $20,000 deposit security deposit for my next tenant. Is that something that I can add to the lease?   Lori: Well, you could try, but that's never going to happen. No one's ever going to agree to that.   Michael: Yeah, I think I think it's a super good point, like, is it within the realm of possibility. Another caveat, I would add is also make sure that it's legal to do because there are some things that, you know, if you added it to a lease, and someone signed it, and this is your kind of binding legal agreement, and then you had to go to court for some reason, someone could look at the lease and say, hey, this is illegal, like, you can't, this is an unenforceable lease, and the whole thing becomes moot. So definitely, don't just be adding things willy nilly work with your property manager working with local attorney to find out hey, is this is this legal in the state of which the lease is being enforced?   Lori: Yeah, and one of the things I always like to add is a rent increase for the next year. So you kind of like, kind of, you know, hit that before you even begin, you know, like, okay, if you stay in, if you want to sign on for a second year, then this is going to be the amount the increase will be.   Michael: That’s so good!   Lori: …known entity, and you don't have to have that discussion, which can be awkward sometimes, or, you know, feel like that you have to negotiate some sort of rent increase. It's just a done deal.   Michael: It's just this is plain black and white language. I love that, I love that. One instance of when this happened, actually, not with regard to the rent increases, but I was listening to a podcast, and they were talking about this exact issue about adding certain things to the lease and so it was like a hold harmless clause about litigation, and the tenant basically waives the right to sue people. So I called my property manager and was like, hey, is this in our leases and he goes, I'm not sure let me check and he got with the attorney. He was like, dude, like, great call out. We're adding it to all of our leases now. So don't think that just because you're hearing about it for the first time that other people aren't as well and don't be afraid to ask those questions or make those suggestions.   Lori: But keep in mind with something like that. Yes, it's a hold harmless for sure. But that may or may not stand up in court.   Michael: Right, fingers, fingers crossed…   Lori: And it doesn't stop anybody, right. It definitely deters it and but it doesn't necessarily stop anyone from suing you.   Michael: Right as landlords often know, all too well.   Lori: Yeah, yeah   Michael: Signed, sealed, delivered. Next.   Pierre: Yeah, check. Let's go. Buying with all cash, is it a recommended practice to pay for a professional appraisal before making an offer?   Lori: You should take this on Michael.   Michael: So before making an offer, I wouldn't say so. I don't think I've never gotten an appraisal prior to making an offer oftentimes, that especially in today's market, we're recording this mid-August 2022, you also have to shoot first ask questions later, sort of a thing. So get your offer out there, get it accepted, get into the due diligence phase, and then figure out all of your questions that need answering and I actually have also never used an appraisal contingency when making an all cash purchase. A lot of agents will tell you investors will tell you that every contingency you have and your part of your offer weakens the offer. So the offer with the least amount. Is that Is that fair to say Lori?   Lori: 100%!...   Michael: Yeah, so…   Lori: …A realtor! Yeah, for sure. Never seen it!   Michael: Yeah. You've never seen it. You oh, you've never seen it with an all cash offer and appraisal contingency?   Lori: No, never.   Michael: Well, there you have it, folks. So I think it's maybe a wise thing to do for yourself, if that's something you need to do. But the I think the thought process behind it is that oftentimes, if you're making an all cash offer, you might be buying the property for less than market value or less than list and so you're building in some buffer there and so the appraisal doesn't really mean anything other than you're buying it based on what an appraiser thinks is fair market value, so all that to say…   Lori: Because, yeah, and the whole reason to buy with cash is because you can get a better deal, you know, yeah, and usually that negates a need for are any sort of appraisal anyway…   Michael: Yeah, I will send me I guess there's an argument to be made of will, hey, we're in a super-hot market properties listed for 100 but I come in 110, all cash. So I'm overpaying and if the appraisal did come back at 100, I mean, maybe there's an argument to be made that, hey, I can, I can negotiate with the seller to reduce the price to 100. But, again, you're just adding more contingencies to your offer. So it all comes down to like, how comfortable are you with the offer you're making with the market value that you can determine with the other tools and resources that you have at your disposal and then, like, if you're wrong, if the number if the market value is lower than what you're actually buying it for? Do you care? Does that mean if you're gonna buy and hold the thing for 10 years, which is my intent for a lot of these properties? I don't really care because like property, still cash flows really well. So, Lori, do you have thoughts kind of in that regard?   Lori: Yeah, I mean, I feel like with the, you know, anytime you're adding anything to be able to get out of the deal, you're lessening your bargaining power 100%. You know, like, you might as well just do it with a loan than why buy with cash, the whole point of cash is, so you have bargaining power…   Michael: Yeah, that's a great, that's a great question. I mean, what about putting in that as part of your offer, as, hey, I reserved, you know, this is an all cash offer, but I reserve the right to go get financing, if I decide to do that. Have you ever seen that?   Lori: You know, I've seen that and it didn't I mean, then then you're just like every other offer, you know, that's looking for a loan, you know, it's like, okay, well, then why would they, you know, you start getting the buyer, the seller, or the agent starting to question like, why are they doing that? Why are they adding that in there? Why are they adding one more obstacle to the purchase?   Mchael: Yeah, I love it.   Lori: Because it's a totally different ballgame. If you have a lender, then you have so many more hoops, you have to jump through…   Michael: Yeah and I think, too, and thinking about this, like, let's try to take off our investor hats for a minute and put on the seller hat and think about, okay, if I'm in the seller seat, and I get this these two offers, one has an appraisal contingency and one doesn’t. How would I How would I respond and when we can think about that, and think about how do we set ourselves apart from all the other offers that the seller is seeing that helps shed light on the scenario as well…   Lori: Oh, 100%! Yeah, if I, when I've had multiple offers on one of my investment properties, I'm not looking at anything has any sort of contingency, and I definitely have preferred cash and picked cash because I know I can close in a couple of weeks.   Michael: Yeah and you probably took lower offers in cash than you would find the next one, man, we're just lining these up, knocking them down   Lori: and giving long answers…   Pierre: All right.   Michael: Big meaty answers, that’s important!   Pierre: That's good, though, you know, you need to provide all the contexts around them. All right, next one here. How often does a buyer use the same property manager that the seller was using?   Lori: I would say like 70-80% of the time I've seen it. It also depends on how forthcoming the current property manager has been to the new buyers, I've had where, you know, the current property manager was a nightmare and didn't want to disclose anything they didn't have to and that didn't set them up. Well, they didn't get to manage the property moving forward with the new buyer.   Michael: What, as a follow up Lori, when do you think, like, what are the pros and what are the cons of staying with the same property manager, if you're an investor buying the property from a seller.   Lori: If you, if you keep that current property manager, they already know the property, they know the issues of the property. The negative would be that you're inheriting any issues that may have been a communication between the property manager and the tenant, you could have all sorts of you just don't know for sure, you know, so I'd say, you know, definitely favor the possibility of using the current property manager, but definitely do your research and make sure you have the best option available.   Michael: Totally. Yeah, I agree. 100% and one other thing I would add to that is if you are changing property managers, like stuff gets fumbled all the time. Like there's a lot of moving pieces, it just a real estate transaction and now we're adding a tenant and property management into the equation and so there's like a physical key handoff that has to happen once you close and then there's documents that have to get handed off and the tenant has to know where are they paying their rent and maybe they have to get on to a new property managers lease so there's just stuff that has to happen so it's not necessarily as plug and play as if you keep the same property manager so I guess I'm going to think about is even if you don't love the new property manager, stick it out for 30 days 15-30 days whatever just get the transaction piece done, let the dust settle and then you can go switch things are less likely to get missed I would I would get I would garner…   Lori: Or even wait till you know you it's time to renew the lease because the lease is going to follow the tenant. So they're not going to change, the lease doesn't get changed necessarily right away, it would follow the tenant. So if you know the lease was only a couple of months in, then you still have 10 months, so you have to follow that lease as the new owner and property manager.   Michael: Sweet! Pierre's speaking from experience.   Pierre: And don't be shy to change your property manager, though, if I'm speaking from experience, what we're going through right now, in this moment, I think we wait, we waited a little too long. We're paying the price, so…   Michael: You're not a real investor and so you fired a property manager…   Pierre: Is it simple for an account holder at your typical bank to wire the EMD online from your bank's website?   Michael: Great question. It depends. I've got, you know, I have I had that ability with my bank. But I don't think every bank offers that. So I would say just do your homework ahead of time and determine what that looks like for you and your bank and if it's physically possible, because if it is great, if it's not, that could be a problem. But the other piece of that I would say to as a follow up is not just the end, but the rest of your deposit. So my bank has an online weekly wire limits, which I've exceeded at times trying to do a deal and I was like, oh, crap, like, I gotta get into a physical bank branch to send the wire because they don't like doing that stuff over the phone. So just make sure that you've got your T's crossed, and I's dotted with regards to how you're physically going to get the money from where it currently is to where it needs to go well in advance of when it actually has to happen.   Lori: Yeah and also be really careful about wire transfers, because I have seen it happen and it was horrendous, where a person had like, they just emailed and got the wire information. But somebody had intercepted it and gave them a different wire transfer information and they wired, I think it was about 100,000 to a bank, never saw the money again. No, just be I'm just saying yeah, make the call. Call the institution that your wire transferring to, and make sure you get like someone telling you the information because I've seen it happen. It's not pretty!   Michael: Yes, we had, we had someone on the podcast a while back, and we were talking about this exact thing and so what Lori is talking about is when you receive the wire instructions, it's probably going to be from the title or escrow company, pick up the phone and call that title or escrow company and say, hey, tell me what you just sent me, I want to confirm the wire instructions and they're going to tell you the account number, the routing number, the bank address where it needs to go and then you can feel more confident that hey, this okay, I'm talking to the person that's on the other end the receiving end of this, as opposed to just a bank in the Seychelles or wherever off the coast…   Lori: Yeah, because once that wire transfer is done, it's done.   Michael: It's gone, yeah.   Pierre: Yeah. Nuts are just Bitcoin.   Michael: Oh, there you go but I guess if you transfer Bitcoin to an account that you didn't want it to, could you…   Pierre: You can get one character wrong, and that those bitcoins will never be asked, and again.   Michael: Bye, bye…Best day ever to wake it up…   Lori: Where the hell did this come from?   Pierre: Yeah. All right, we're gonna go to the next one here. Do lenders typically fund 80% of the appraised value, 80% of the purchase price or whichever is lower?   Michael: Lori, you want it?   Lori: Whichever is lower? Yeah... Any way they cannot give you more money…   Michael: Yes. It's the sad reality. So you got to take your purchase price, and then your appraised value, if you're getting an appraisal, but of course, if you're using a lender, they're going to make you get an appraisal and so we're going to take 80% of that and whichever is lower and a lot of lenders do, by the way, like aren't going up to 80%. LTV, I'm seeing 70 or 75%. LTV. So the 8020 rule is not a rule, I would say it's kind of a guideline and so ask your lender. Hey, how much what LTV? Can I get out? I got anything else on that one? Yeah, that's, that was an easy way to stay straightforward.   Pierre: Yeah, that's a that's an easy one. Next one here: What is a rough rule of thumb for calculating insurance costs for a rental when you are evaluating properties during that time before you're making offers?   Michael: I'll take a stab at this one! Yeah, so I have kind of two, two thresholds one is for a property purchase price of 150k or less, and the other is for 150k or more, and so on 150k or less, I see for like, strong quality insurance point eight to 1.2% of the purchase price. So if we just roll that straight up the middle on $100,000 house, if you're paying about 1000 bucks a year Insurance, I'd say that's probably pretty close. Now, could you go get insurance for 500 bucks 600 bucks a year? Probably that that exists, I would imagine. But what's it going to cover is the question we need to be asking and so if we're trying to save 2, 3, 4-100 bucks a year on insurance costs, but we're cutting out a huge subset of the coverages or taking a really high deductible, it might come back to bite us in the butt and so you don't need to become an insurance expert to invest in real estate. But you definitely want to have a base level of understanding of okay, what are the coverages that are available? What do they actually cover? So not just, hey, these are the checkboxes, I'm checking for coverage but what do they mean? How do they come into effect and then what do they cost and you'll see like, there are some really expensive coverages that might not be worthwhile and there might be some really cheap coverages that, absolutely, you should be paying the extra 20 bucks a year to get and so I think that point eight to 1.2%, will get you within the realm of closeness and insurance costs change over time to like, just like property values change over time, insurance markets harden and soften and I come from this world, for better or for worse and so the market has been hardened in like the last eight, nine years or so and so costs are going up. Now, we'd go to the subset of properties 150k, or more in terms of purchase price, and we're probably in that point five to point seven ballpark range. So if you're buying a property for $280,000, I would be shocked if you were paying $2,500 a year in insurance, you might be at the 14-15 $1,600 price point, again, for some really great coverage and so a lot of the reasoning behind that is might be getting too deep in the weeds here. But there's just a minimum policy amount that insurance companies charge, baseline doesn't really matter how little the coverage is. So you could be getting an insurance policy for a $10,000 house or an $80,000 house, those two policies might cost fairly similarly, because they're on the lower tier just of cost for the insurance company to issue that policy. As you start getting higher and higher, your cost of insurance tends to go down on a percentage, or $1 threshold dollar per square foot threshold. So Lori, I hope I didn't just get too deep in the weeds there. But any, any thoughts?   Lori: No, no, you are the insurance expert, I leave that to you…   Michael: If I am the expert here then we are all in trouble. But that's again, just a very rough ballpark rules of thumb, I would say and that's going to be for your dwelling policy itself. There are lots of different kinds of insurances that people can get. But the kind of the big ones are the dwelling fire or the landlord policy is what people often refer to that covers, like the structure itself, and then also some liability for the owner. But there are both on insurance policies as well that don't come standard and so you really need to understand, hey, if you're getting this insurance policy, what's not covered and that's a really great question to ask of your insurance carrier, it's often going to be but not entirely limited to, that's my legalese disclosure there, flood is going to be a separate policy as his earthquake, wind can or cannot be depending on the area. So you again, you need to really understand what are the natural hazards that are affecting this area? Is it in a flood zone? If it is, and you have a loan lender is likely going to require that you get flood insurance…   Lori: 99% of the time! Yeah!   Michael: Right, so if you're the person that's using all cash, and not getting their appraisal, I guess an appraisal probably wouldn't pick that stuff up. But if you're using an all cash offer, you want to be darn certain about if you're in a flood zone or not because no one might come to your rescue and tell you, oh, hey, by the way, investor, this is in a flood zone, please go get flood insurance. So you just again, want to understand what the exposures are in the area and talking to a local insurance agent is going to be I think one of the best ways to do that, if that's something you're not comfortable doing on your own, unless you're like a total NAT has nerd like me, which I hope no one else out there is…   Lori: Well, and flood zones are super common in certain areas, like we have in where I live, you know, it's like there's some definite flood zones, and then those are prime investor properties because nobody wants to purchase them to live in as their primary because you have to pay for flood insurance, and it can be quite cost prohibitive for someone who's, you know, in that income range and living in those properties. So, you know, but as an investor, it's absolutely doable.   Pierre: And Mike, so does fire insurance come standard in your current policy at your primary?   Michael: Yes. And so that's the biggest hazard that's being protected against in in a standard dwelling policy or landlord policy.   Pierre: And then a separate question across your portfolio. Do you require all of your renters to have renter insurance?   Michael: That's a really good question. Yes, I think like technically by the letter of the law they are supposed to, whether they are get it or not is a different issue I really pushing to have that kind of be the uniform across the board. But it's I think, if you asked me today a gun to my head does every single one your renters have it? I would probably say no…   Lori: I know that like, and different college towns, I know that they require it. So it's like, if you don't already have it, and you have to prove that you have it, then you have to purchase through them. So through the property manager, so that's also an option too.   Pierre: Yeah and is there like a standard process because I know that when you're renting, you kind of as you're signing the lease and collecting all of the papers, you require them to submit their insurance? What about when you renew the lease? Are you asking them to send in updated insurance proof for each renewal of the lease?   Lori: I mean, it's definitely a good idea to do, so. You know, it can just be you know, when you know, because you'll have a copy of their current renter's insurance and you'll see when it expires, and you can just say, hey, you know, part of the process, you know, you just put it in as an extra clause in the lease.   Michael: I think it's a great idea.     Pierre: All right. Final question from this lesson, I think we'll wrap up on this one, who will replace the property in case of total property loss as a part of replacement costs? Will the insurance company construct or pay cash to rebuild…   Michael: I love that everyone's asking this insurance questions. So it's gonna go like this. So I had two fires in a property.   Pierre: I was gonna throw that in the question, if your property catches fire, Michael, yeah, twice, what do you do   Michael: What do you do? So the insurance company is you are the insurance companies client and so the property manager can assist in this whole process and it is a process getting everything squared away and corrected. But the idea is that the insurance company is going to read pay to have the property rebuilt, they are not going to go find the contractors, they're not going to go pull permits, they're not going to work with the city to make that happen, that's going to be on you as the owner. So if you have a total loss strap in, because it's probably going to suck, but it can, it can be okay, like, don't freak out, something I would absolutely recommend doing is if the insurance company is not playing ball with you go get a public adjuster. This is someone who's an advocate for you as a client, they're often paid based on commission. So however much additional they're able to help you collect from the insurance company, they'll get a cut of that it's worth every stinking Penny, because without them, you wouldn't have a dime more than the insurance company is willing to give you. That being said, so the insurance company is going to pay to have the house rebuilt up to the limit of the policy, and the policy limit that's stipulated in the policy itself. So that's kind of the guiding light, if you will, as to how much the insurance company is going to pay.   Now, they are often going to give you a check to get the property construction started to kind of get the process underway. But if you opt to not rebuild the property, the amount of money that you're going to walk away with is likely going to be less than the number listed on your policy. So if you have $100,000 policy, and the house burns down, do not expect a check for $100,000. They're gonna say, okay, well, here's $40,000, to start get the property rebuilt and as you do that, they're likely going to give you incremental draws on the policy as the property is getting rebuilt or they might say, hey, you know what, here's 90 grand, you get the other 10% once the property is completed, or once the construction is X percent done, because they're going to say, hey, if you don't rebuild the property, if you're going to take the cash, we're going to give you less. So that's kind of in a nutshell how it works. It's a lot more nuanced than that the policy can respond in a number of different ways and so policy language is really beyond the scope of this show, and my knowledge to because every policy is little bit different. But if you have a replacement cost policy, that's likely how it's how it's going to go. If you have an actual cash value policy and ACV policy, it's going to be a little bit different. They're going to look at that $100,000 house and say, hey, it's 30 to 2030 years old, it's only worth 60 grand. Here's a check. 60 grand, thank you very much best of luck to you and so I think it's very, very, very important to evaluate, especially if you have a loan, especially if you have a loan, what type of insurance policy you're getting is a replacement cost or is it actual cash value? Replacement Cost is the stronger of the two. It's the safer of the two I would argue but it's the more expensive of the two on most single family homes are see replacement cost is for sure the way to go on multifamily if you can get it like I have. I have properties that were built in 1908. The insurance company didn't even give me the option for replacement costs it was here's the actual cash value, take it or leave it kind of a thing and with partial losses, that's where you can get in to real, real trouble. So again, I'm gonna step off my soapbox here for a minute and leave you all with that.   Pierre: Lori, do you have anything to add on that one or did Mike just…   Lori: No really, me it's pretty straightforward. I always like it, just simplify it. I always just say, you know, think about when you have a car and it gets, you know, you have an accident or whatever, it's the same kind of thing, you know, like, they're not going to go find you a new car, you know, to purchase, they're gonna give you the money and you have to handle the rest of yourself. So, yeah, so like a simplified version.   Pierre: Excellent. Thanks, Lori, for joining us. We're happy to have you back on.   Lori: Thanks.   Pierre: And thank you all for submitting your questions, keep them coming. We love answering your questions. You can submit them on iTunes or as comments on YouTube and we will catch you on the next episode.   Michael: Happy investing…