[PA] I believe the seller may have known about a very expensive issue with my house without disclosing it. Can I do anything about it? Real Estate |
- [PA] I believe the seller may have known about a very expensive issue with my house without disclosing it. Can I do anything about it?
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- Tax deduction for losing thousands on a house purchase that fell through [NC]
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- [NoVA]Need help to decide if this is a good idea with VHDA ADUs.
- Borrowing money from parents to avoid contingency
- Buying a house with a sewer easement (Apex,NC)
- Seattle Housing Market? Thoughts?
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| Posted: 24 Feb 2018 02:42 PM PST Hello! I bought my first house 2 years ago for $55k (appraised at the time for 60k). I lived in the house for about a year before discovering the issue. The issue is that the terra-cotta sewer lateral fully dislocated. When video inspecting the line, the pipe merely ends at a wall of mud. You can see the very top of the pipe that should continue to the main line about an inch below the bottom lip of the pipe that the camera is in. Visual description here To make matters worse, the dislocation happens like a foot away from the main line (aka in the middle of the street) and is somewhere between 9 & 12 feet deep. When the problem first arose last year, I got a bunch of quotes, with most hovering around the 13-15k range (25% the value of the property!). Around the same time I was getting quotes, I also tried contacting the water company, homeowners insurance, & the local municipality to see if there was anything that they could do since its in the middle of the street & at the sewer tap. All of them told me that the pipe is my responsibility and that there is nothing they can do to help. Though they wouldnt help with the cost, the water company & municipality were very helpful and provided recommendations for plumbers that they like to use and the water company came out to inspect the line from the main sewer side. The water company's supervisor who was on site while they were doing the inspection told me that a problem as severe as this had to have been apparent for years. I was able to get the pipe to drain again (it took 3 plumbers before one was able to get it to drain), but it has recently started clogging again.. Since the issue first presented, I have been saving every penny I could in order to fix the problem, but as mentioned before, it is an enormous amount of money.. I also got a personal loan for 5k, but even with that, I'm still currently only at 9k & it will likely take another 6ish months before i save enough to pay for it. Thankfully, the sewer backups are contained to the concrete floor'd garage (aka the best case scenario for a sewer backup. its at least somewhat manageable) Sorry about the novel of a backstory. Regarding the actual question in the title, I believe the seller may have known about the issue without disclosing it & am wondering if I have a case or not. The seller is an out-of-state real estate investor who owns a bunch of properties (including the commercial office building next door to me). According to google maps, sometime between 2011 & when I purchased the house (2015), they installed a cleanout for the sewer line. Inside the house, there is a sticker from a local plumber (dated 2013) with some hand written notations of the services that the plumber provided. I sent a picture of the sticker to the plumber to ask what the notations meant & if he had any records of the visit. He called back the next day saying that the notations were his handwriting and that they indicated that he sent a snake from the cleanout to the street approximately 50' (the dislocation is right around 50 feet away from the cleanout). He said that they also indicated that he took a video inspection of the line, but he didn't remember or have records of what the results of the video were. Anyway, I'm just wondering if the plumber's sticker & the cleanout construction are enough to prove that the seller knew of the problem without disclosing it. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 24 Feb 2018 06:25 PM PST Hello My wife and I purchased a waterfront block of land in a suburban location 7 years ago that has grown from $300,000 and is now worth 1,300,000. We want to sell the property but the stamp duty tax would be enormous (50% of sale) and we can't afford to build a house on the block. We have another investment property and the banks will not loan us any more money. Also, the housing market here is going down and we want to sell before it gets too low. We thought about placing a tiny house on the block and living in it. In Australia there is 0 tax for a house that is principle place of residence. On the title it says we can place a mobile home if the neighbours agree. Can we simply get neighbour approval and then live in a tiny house for three months and claim a tax free sale? We have the tiny house ready to go. What about the council? Will they allow us to place a tiny house (classified as a registered vehicle) on the vacant block? Do we even need to tell council? Any advice would be much appreciated. Thank you [link] [comments]  |
| What is the best online real estate investment group to join? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 10:29 PM PST |
| Posted: 24 Feb 2018 02:39 PM PST Does anyone know if it is more difficult to obtain a California Real Estate Agent License vs a Texas Agent? Im currently in between states living wise. Trying to figure which would be best to pursue in less time as possible. I would only be taking online courses since there are no schools that offer courses anywhere near where I currently live. Ps: if you have any online school suggestions, that would be much appreciated. Currently looking at this school: https://www.theceshop.com/pre-licensing-states It also offers a multiple state license in which I may also consider. Thank you! [link] [comments]  |
| Best way to get private owned home? Posted: 25 Feb 2018 01:01 AM PST I've never owned a home, and my credit is close to nonexistent. There's no way my credit would be able to qualify for an Agency Owned home soon enough. I have a new family, and would like to move to a house soon and need the room. Not sure what to do... I've heard private owned homes are my best bet, but have no good resource to find said homes. Help? I'm in Spokane, WA, USA. I mean rent to buy or just rent. Not really looking to buy a home yet. I know that's just simply not possible without credit. [link] [comments]  |
| [SoCal-USA] Best use of money to reduce amount paid on interest. Housing vs investing. Posted: 25 Feb 2018 12:47 AM PST So I have about $20,000 saved as Emergency Fund (approx 6 months of expenses or 3 months of what I take home). I am maxing out my Roth IRA and tax advantage opportunities (401k, matching, etc) from my work. I have no student loan debt, but part of the reason why I don't is because I instead took on my Parent's house mortgage (instead of having $140k of student debt). My parent's retired so since I am paying more than 50% of their monthly payments which allows me to become head of household and claim parent's as dependents. So my questions is mainly on what to do about the house. My parent's refinanced after the '08 crash as incentive to keep the house and not go into foreclosure. It was to reduce payments as much as possible which they did a 40 year with escalating interest rate every 2-3 years to a max fixed rate of 4.875% (which happened last year). The big plus to this refinance was that $130k is non-interest bearing principal balance. What is left on the house principal is around $245k. I also have some extra money saved in a online savings account of about $75k which I saved to purchase another condo/apart/home closer to my work (to get as close as I can to 20% to avoid PMI) at a 15 year fixed. I am hoping that will happen within the next 2 years (ideally very soon). I have in the past tempted to invest in the stock market or to put into the house. And continue to go back and forth on what to do with the saving. Now I know that I would get better return on stock market than I would on paying off the house, however I think after about 10 or so years I will probably end up wanting to sell the house to use the equity on upgrading to a better home. Either combining the two house equity or making the new condo/apart/home one that I will rent out. I think the location of my parent's house is not ideal for renting out and I don't plan to live there long term so most likely will not see myself keeping it for another 30 or so years. So would it be best to pay extra into the principal balance of the current house and shorten the length as much as possible since right now I am paying mostly interest on the house? Or should I just dump most of the $75k into the principal of the house and not worry about PMI on a new home? Should I refinance the current house to a 15 year fixed (despite 130k not bearing interest?) Or leave the house payments as is and invest the extra money or put more into the savings account so I can avoid PMI on the new home? [link] [comments]  |
| How hard is it to get a mortgage at 3.5-5% down? Is this wise? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 03:07 PM PST I'm 26 and have pretty good income (70k), which I expect to go up over time. Hopefully significantly (software developer). No debt whatsoever. Now that my student loans are paid off I would like to buy a single family home or condo in Chicago. I plan to spend $200k or less on the property. Living at home currently and its getting old. I could continue to live here and have a nice 20% down payment in about 2 years. Moving out and renting obviously would delay this. On the other hand I could scrape $10k together pretty quickly. Is my plan reasonable? Does it make sense to pay PMI or am I a fool for even considering it? How difficult is it to qualify for a 3.5%-5% down FHA loan? How difficult is buying a property with an FHA loan? I've heard of offers being passed over because the buyers were using FHA loans. [link] [comments]  |
| Ethical Behavior Question as I try to buy a house [OH] (Crossposted to r/Realtors) Posted: 24 Feb 2018 05:35 AM PST Update -- My realtor finally heard from the other guys! We're waiting on their financing; it was just a case of dragging their feet getting back to us (why call if there's no substantive information). Thanks, everyone, for your help! I've submitted an offer to purchase a house, so I'm stoked and ready to buy it. But I've run into an odd situation. There was already a contingent offer when I submitted mine, so I'm waiting to see if that falls through or if I get a chance to go for it. This I understand. Here's where things get odd: the selling realtors have ignored my realtor's calls requesting information about the status of the house and my offer. I put my bid in two weeks ago, had my realtor contact them on Monday, and here it is Saturday with zero response from either of the two listing agents. Things get even stranger when you throw this into the mix: my coworker lives in the house nextdoor, and asked his neighbor (the seller) how the house was going. The seller stated that the original offer fell through a week ago, and there have been no other offers. Their listing agents have not presented my offer to them, even though it has been a week since the original deal fell through. I don't think I'm supposed to know this, but my coworker thought he was doing me a favor in telling me. I can't un-learn it. I thought that the realtors legally have to present all offers made on a house to the seller in order. Their realtor's behavior seems unethical. I have two kids and want to move out of my crime-ridden area: what recourse do I have? Are there legal ramifications? I haven't told my realtor about my knowledge yet, because I'm not sure yet how that comes into play. tl;dr I made an offer on a house. The seller's realtors refuse to respond to my realtor and also have not told the seller about my offer. Do I have any recourse? [Edit: Update] [link] [comments]  |
| How should I "prepare" before the appraisal for our Refi? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 05:19 AM PST We just started the refinance process and the lender ordered the appraisal yesterday. Haven't heard from the appraiser yet, but I'm assuming it will happen sometime next week. If it matters, we're in Florida. Any recommendations, other than cleaning up, mowing the yard, etc? [link] [comments]  |
| Any landlord or home owners working with cryptocurrency? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 10:16 PM PST Wondering if this recent crypto boom has spread to the real estate environment yet. Does anyone here take crypto currency for real estate or heard of anyone doing so? In NYC [link] [comments]  |
| Best way to build credit before investing? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 08:30 AM PST I have an LLC in Indianapolis, IN with a bank account and would like to build credit on the LLC in order to buy a property in a few years. What would you recommend to be the best approach to build credit on the LLC in order to do this? I was thinking of getting some credit cards and using those but I am not sure how many cards is enough or if this is even the best way to do it. [link] [comments]  |
| Tax deduction for losing thousands on a house purchase that fell through [NC] Posted: 24 Feb 2018 12:43 PM PST The most bitter part of 2017 for me was when I lost more than $5,000 on the purchase of a house that fell through after being under contract for just 3 days. I'll spare you the details unless you need or want more info, but it was caused by a combination of my naivety, desperation, and a scummy realtor. Most of the lost money was for the due diligence fee. In North Carolina, if the sale doesn't go through for any reason after any amount of time under contract, you lose this fee and the seller keeps it. Everybody I've mentioned this to in other states had never heard of anything like this, so I want to emphasize that the lost money was not earnest money--that was a totally separate fee that I fortunately was able to recoup because the sale fell through quickly enough. Anyway, can I deduct this loss on my taxes? tl/dr: Lost $5,000+ as a potential home buyer when the sale fell through after 3 days under contract. This was not earnest money, it was mainly the due diligence fee. Can I deduct this loss on my taxes? [link] [comments]  |
| Selling a home soon. Asked my agent about the commission structure ... Posted: 24 Feb 2018 02:00 PM PST She responded with "Can you please send over your principal balance and I'm happy to draw up a net sheet for you when I return. " I've know her awhile and she is my property manager for this property. I feel like that is a question like. "Well how big is your budget." I think I should be able to negotiate a resonable flat fee. [link] [comments]  |
| Open house and noisy upstairs neighbors Posted: 24 Feb 2018 07:34 PM PST I live in a Boston suburb two family condo conversion house on the bottom two floors. We get along well with our above neighbors, but never really told them that they are "too loud". It might not be their fault, the insulation and flooring may be lacking and might contribute more- but either way you can hear them when they're home. We are planning to put our unit on the market in two weeks and have not yet informed them. That said, we'd like to plan the open houses around times they are not home, and having a difficult time tryin to figure out a polite way of communicating this. Ideally we would like them to be off premises during the Saturday and Sunday open houses. If anyone has experience or advice around communicating this in a polite manner it would be greatly appreciated! [link] [comments]  |
| [NoVA]Need help to decide if this is a good idea with VHDA ADUs. Posted: 24 Feb 2018 07:31 PM PST Hi, my father and I came up with this idea and wonder if this makes financial sense. I request to keep this strictly financial. In 2003 my parents were able to buy an Affordable Dwelling Unit (ADU) that was came with a lot of restrictions on selling. In 2003 it was purchased for 120K. For the controlled term of 15 years, if we decided to sell the house, we have to sell it back to the county at a fixed price (120k+inflation+any upgrades we paid). After 15 years, we can sell it to the market at market price; HOWEVER, any profit we realize is split in half with the county. 15 years later (this year), my parents are retired and I still live with them at this home. I have been helping them with the mortgage payments while they handle the utilities. I currently hand my father checks every month so this is basically my "rent" which gives me no equity, or tax benefits. It is my dad's wish for me to take ownership of the house and continue paying off the mortgage, but a transfer of ownership is not allowed within the guidelines of the program because I make too much money and is therefore ineligible to own the ADU. If we sell the house at market value (approx 340K), we would realize nearly 160K in profit after all upgrades and inflation is taken into consideration, and would therefore split about 80k with the County. Now on to the idea. Since we are not allowed to simply transfer ownership, what if my dad sold me the house at market value, and I take out a mortgage that covers the rest of my father's mortgage as well as pay's the county the split they are entitled to. My father has approximately 60k left on the mortgage. Theoretically, I would take out a mortgage of 60k+80k=140K to pay off my dad's mortgage as well as the county's cut. This serves the following benefits: -Gives me complete ownership of the house free of the ADU program -since my father does not have a salary and thus does not pay a lot of taxes, I would be able to deduct more on my taxes with my salary if I paid the property taxes, -allows me to rent out the property if i choose to (ADU does not allow renting out), and -when I sell it, i will realize 100% of the gains (which may be higher in the future). We are still about 9 months away from the end of the 15 year term, and this is all based on a limited understanding of real estate. Of course when the time comes I will consult a professional, but I was hoping if any redditor can tell me if this makes financial sense, or if I am missing something before I pursue this option. And is this even possible? Thank you in advance for your help and for reading all of this. [link] [comments]  |
| Borrowing money from parents to avoid contingency Posted: 24 Feb 2018 03:12 PM PST My wife and I are looking to move (selling our current home and moving to a bigger house). Our original thinking was that we would need to have a contingency in order to put 20% down on the new house (conventional 30 yr), as we didn't have enough cash without the net proceeds from our current house. This makes getting offers accepted much more difficult and adds more stress while trying to time the whole process. However, my parents recently offered to loan us the money we would need for 20% down, which we could repay as soon as our house sells. They would be borrowing from their own HELOC and have up to $50k available. We would need only about $30k loaned to cover the rest of the down payment/closing costs and from talking with our real estate agent, we should net about $50k from our current home. She also expects the home to sell very quickly as it's a desirable neighborhood with nothing else available currently. What do we need to know about going down this path?
Anything else I'm missing that I should be considering here? Are there any other options to avoiding a contingency? [link] [comments]  |
| Buying a house with a sewer easement (Apex,NC) Posted: 24 Feb 2018 02:49 PM PST Location : Apex, NC First, the real estate market here is crazy. Homes are under contract in as little as a day. People offering over asking on properties that clearly won't appraise, so they have to waive the appraisal contingency. I found a house that I really like that is listed at $329,900, which is in line with the comps for the area. It was built in 1998. I offered $335,000, because, apparently, that's what you have to do here. I haven't signed a contract yet. On their disclosure, they indicate that there is a 20 foot town easement on the east side of the property. This is the only house in the development that has this line running through the yard. The problem is, that there is really only about 20-25 feet between the houses in this neighborhood, so the easement covers the entire space between homes. I don't know exactly where the line is, but it appears to be about 10 feet from either house based on the map. I looked at the town map for easements and see that it is either a gravity sewer, or main force line. The legend isn't very clear. The line extends from the extreme rear of the property (it does not extend past the rear of the property line) with the flow going past the house, toward the street, where it meets up with the remainder of the line and continues on and out of the neighborhood to a town pump station, which leads me to believe that this is a force line. There is manhole access at the extreme end of the property on the property line, and in front of the house on the street. I found out today that there are no offers on the house yet after almost three days, which is very unusual for the area. Is this something to run away from? It feels like a potential nightmare. I was planning on contacting the town building department on Monday to find out more. Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Seattle Housing Market? Thoughts? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 09:25 AM PST I am in a situation where my building is being sold off and would like to hear thoughts on the Seattle housing Market. Because of these circumstances I might buckle down and start looking to buy slightly outside of the city. My biggest concern is investing into this tech bubble. I am not sure is this a tech bubble or a tech bedrock -aka will housing just keep fluctuating at the rate it is going with no turning back? If the latter is the case then I am more keen on buying than to rent and save more money and wait it out a bit more. Otherwise I am getting relatively anxious with every 6 months I hold out prices go up exponentially. This latest development in what I had thought was a pretty cushy long term rental situation is coming to a crashing halt so I appreciate everyone's insights. Thank you! [link] [comments]  |
| USDA loan and a consulting business from home? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 05:48 PM PST Hello! I own a house in NC that I have bought with a usda loan. My spouse is wanting to do online consulting and use the address for her business. Should I have any concerns since it does not create profit agricultural? I realize I cannot profit from the land (farming) but what about other businesses? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 24 Feb 2018 11:25 AM PST Can any of you who refer clients to credit repair companies share how they originally reached out to you and what ultimately sold you about them? I've been trying to figure out what works a bit doing some cold calling and emailing, but not had too much luck. I'm thinking I might have to hit the pavement. Advice appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| Are real estate agents incentivized to help me sell my house for top dollar? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 04:43 PM PST I'm selling my home. As part of that process, my agent has put together a collection of "comps," along with a suggested asking price. I live in a very desirable area (Nashville, TN) , and at the moment my home is the only one for sell in the neighborhood. I'm a little frustrated, because based on the comps that I'm seeing, I believe my agent is trying to shortchange our best asking price by about $20,000. As I was thinking about this, the following occurred to me. I'd like to hear your thoughts. It seems to me that a real estate agent is not incentivized to help me get the best possible sell price. It's actually in their best interest to try and undercut the competition so they can move my house as quickly as possible, collect their 6%, then move on to their next deal. For them, selling these homes is a volume game, whereas for me that $20,000 difference in asking price is more important. Am I being too cynical here, or does this sound about right? [link] [comments]  |
| Should I stay or should I go? Property in Baltimore. Posted: 24 Feb 2018 03:52 PM PST I own in Baltimore city's Westport neighborhood. Westport (http://bit.ly/2ourpwk) is a depressed area near an undeveloped section of waterfront. I purchased just before the 2008 recession as the area was being hyped at the next Inner Harbor with exciting architectural renderings. It's an amazing location with views of the harbor, a light rail station and easy access to the highway. Also, a large chunk of waterfront property is owned by Sagamore Development Corporation, (owned by Kevin Plank of Underarmour), the same company that has revitalized the nearby neighborhood of Port Covington. Here's an article about the area: http://bit.ly/2F3zt1a. So while that is all very promising, the neighborhood is very depressed at present, there's an active drug corner two blocks away, and a vacant house on one side. Unsurprisingly, it's really hard to get good tenants. The most recent tenants, who I just evicted, left me $5000 in the hole with unpaid rent, damage to the property and a big mess to clean up. My quandary now is whether to sell the place and take a loss, board it up and wait for better days, or try hard to find some decent tenants. I have about 160k in the property (purchase plus renovation) and a mortgage of about $650 per month. I'd appreciate any thoughts on what I should do. [link] [comments]  |
| How much can I expect to make doing rentals 30 hours a week out of a brokerage in Boston? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 10:26 AM PST I'm a full time college student and I'm trying to consider if I should quit my 2 part time 13 and 14 an hour jobs. I'm halfway through the real estate course and should be licensed in 2 weeks or so. I have a friend at a large brokerage in the heart of the city who's going to help me get in hopefully. [link] [comments]  |
| Options for financing house work? Posted: 24 Feb 2018 10:08 AM PST I'm buying a house, and my current lender doesn't offer FHA loans, which I understand the risks of. And there aren't lots of lenders in my area doing them. I need to have the amp service to the home updated and replace some old wires (it's currently at 60amps). I cannot do this out of pocket. What are some realistic options for financing this project? The home inspector seems to think it wouldn't be 10k, not sure why since all of the electricians I've spoken to have quoted me at that. (Located in Iowa) [link] [comments]  |
| I was asked about H1B vs greencard status by seller agent Posted: 24 Feb 2018 05:35 PM PST I am buying a house and was asked if I am greencard/H1B/citizen. Is this question legal? I am in California. [link] [comments]  |
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