How to Find Buyers For Your Duplex

Is it time to sell your duplex or other multifamily?  Are you ready to move in to a regular house and (ugh) make mortgage payments yourself?  Maybe you want to sell to raise cash and start putting the money into other investments.  Whatever the reason for selling your duplex, you may need to go beyond just putting it on the MLS and listing with a realtor, especially in this economy.

Duplexes and other multifamily properties are generally purchased by investors (like yourself).  If you want to find these investors, you’ll need to go where they hang out.  I found this list on the internet of places where they hang out.  The list is generally for wholesalers to help them build a buyer’s list, but could be used to find a buyer for your duplex. Continue reading


Andy Heller Lease Option Course

Last month I went to my local REIA meeting to hear national speaker Andy Heller come and give a talk on lease options. He and his partner Scott Frank have been buying houses and then selling them on lease options for ‘maximum profits’.  You can read more on Andy’s website called Regular Riches.

I really enjoyed Andy’s presentation on lease options, especially since I am trying to lease option my only single family rental so I can concentrate on renting my duplexes.  He gave a talk during the regular monthly meeting of my REIA and then had an additional all-day Saturday class two weeks later (for $59) where he went more in-depth into his strategies.  He even handed out his Amazon ebook – Sell Even Lower for free.  I do not want to give away all that he talked about, but he had some great tips and techniques.   Continue reading


Mailbox Money

The real reason we are in this real estate game is to create wealth. Well what if you could receive cash payments from your rental properties without the hassle of being a landlord?  Just go out to your mailbox each month, open envelopes with checks in them and cash them at the bank?  No broken plumbing, no advertising for tenants, no dealing with tenant complaints…sound good?  You bet it does.  Well here’s how…

I had a conversation on the phone the other day with Marc Faulkner of Creative Funding Service.  The audio of the phone call can be found below.  Marc is a note broker.  What that means is that Marc buys and sells mortgages to private individuals and financial institutions, many times at a discount.  Basically he helps you become the bank, not the landlord.

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Where to Buy a Duplex?

I subscribe to the City of Minneapolis website in order to find out the latest on new rules and regulations.  The other day, the City sent me this email:

From: City of Minneapolis [mailto:minneapolis@govdelivery.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 01, 2011 4:43 PM
To: Cranmer, Hal
Subject: 2011 2nd Quarter “Minneapolis Trends” Report and Major Development Project Maps as of July 1st Continue reading

Size Matters – or at least the appearance of size!

Every landlord wants to get the most rent they can.  In general I have found when renting out my properties that the ones with the biggest rooms, especially kitchens and bathrooms, command the most rent.  Makes sense right?  The bigger houses sell for more.  However, many duplexes and other multifamily properties have smaller rooms.  So how to help in these cases? Continue reading


“I’ve Got a Guy” – How to Find A Contractor for Your Duplex

If you buy a duplex and run it as a rental property, sooner or later you will have to perform some kind of maintenance or fix up for it.  Some of the maintenance or repairs can be done by you but other stuff will require a contractor.  For me in Minneapolis, I can’t do much of anything.  City and county ordinances require me to use a licensed contractor for even the simplest plumbing and electrical work.  You might find yourself in the same boat.  So how do you find a respectable contractor for your rental duplex without paying an arm and a leg.  Well, read on… Continue reading


How to Get Maximum Rent for a Vacancy

On Friday one of my best tenants called to say that one of them would be taking a job out of state and are putting in their notice for a November 1st move-out.  On the one hand this is sad for me, because I really liked them, they kept the place nice and neat, and they always paid their rent on time.  However, I was charging (what I believe) was below market rent and this may be a chance to increase my cash flow. Continue reading


An Idea for Increasing Rents

Many property managers have duplexes and other rental properties near colleges.  That means you might rent to a lot of students who reluctantly sign up for a full year lease but really want to go back home in the summer time and not necessarily want to pay rent for a place they are not occupying.  Well I was referred to a website by a friend that might help both you AND your tenant if that is the case.  It doesn’t have to be just college students.  Anyone that you rent to who doesn’t want to occupy the place for the whole year may want to take advantage of this opportunity.  Continue reading


FinestExpert.com

While searching around for other real estate websites that might make my life easier, I came across ‘FinestExpert.com’.  This website seems like a pretty good website for people looking for properties.  Also it would be a good resource for people wanting to sell their property because it would give them an idea of what they might be able to price it for.

The website tries to look at properties from a strictly financial point of view.  Like many other real estate websites, the information is only as accurate as the data that it was given.  For instance, there is no way the website would know what kind of work a property needs to get it up to speed.  So you can’t just rely on a website like this to answer all your questions – you need to do a full analysis. Continue reading