So I just had my section 8 tenants vacate. What a mess. Unbelievable roach infestation. They never informed me off the roach problem) Dead mice in walls. Reeks of nicotine. Complete gut and rehab. Fun! (Was my plan to gut the place eventually, but has to be done now.)
Lucky for me I can do it all…plaster, drywall, electric (if I ever get a permit. **** license requirements), framing. Dad is going to help with the trim and cabinets.
But section 8 tenants man…
Worst thing about Section 8 is they can sometimes live anywhere.
I think the maximum benefit was something like $2,400 a month which means if they have enough dependents, they could live in neighborhoods much nicer than anything I could afford to live in. I endured Section 8 neighbors one year, they destroyed the place.
Owner had to do a new roof, pulled out every piece of dry way and somehow they broke a toilet, the actual bowl not any of the parts. They vacated middle of the night with no notice and a night later around 2am I noticed a pickup truck parked next to the house loading up the washer and dryer, they of course left the house completely unlocked.
If the owner wasn’t an absolute jackass I might have cared, but that automatic payment incentive will never offset the cost of the damage they will do. They don’t own it so they don’t care about it and their indifference can be at a level most people can’t even comprehend. The only good thing is they know their benefit check is good anywhere so sometimes it can be easy to run them off.
Once I get that unit rehabbed, I could get 995/month from section 8. Could make my unit section 8 as well and collect damn near 2000/month. It’s crazy and one reason rent is so high. If I convert it to a single family home and rent, I’ll get anywhere from 1800-2400/month.
What drives me nuts is my tenant made no effort to work so HUD subsidized 100% plus a utility allowance
I believe this is pretty common with section 8 tenants. People don’t have to pay for something they have no respect for it. They feel entitled and don’t mind trashing the place.
What I don’t get is why they didn’t tell me how bad conditions were getting. With covid, I couldn’t really do regular inspections. So I made the mistake of relying on them. Oh well.
Welcome to Socialism.
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Yeah but you have to live in it! [emoji2961]. I’m by no means a clean freak but I’ll be damned if I’m going to be living with roaches.
I dunno man, I lived in socialism and it was the exact opposite. What little you had you gave a shit about. You would even come up with creative ways of fixing it or getting the proper materials. You wouldn’t be caught dead living in squalor
This not caring about anything, including living in ones own filth is a very capitalistic problem.
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It’s what happens when you practice socialism in a capitalistic society. They burn down the projects, the projects get rebuilt. If you burned down Housing Unit 28B in East Berlin you were kind of screwed.
I think mentality was different altogether. Even in the US how much of this would you actually see in the 50s? 40s? 20s? There’s always been poor and there’s always been ghettos but people cared about what they looked like and how they presented themselves.
Besides, socialism, at least the one I know, the government didn’t pay you it set prices for you to pay. Thats a very general explanation of a very complicated issue but basically…in this case… they set the rent price so that you can pay
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The poor today aren’t poor. Section 8 pays enough for a decent house (not apartment), medical is free, as are cell phones, you get a debit card for food, you get a multi $1000s check from the IRS every spring, and college is paid for. If you want something and can’t pay for it, steal it. The courts will be nice to you because “you stole to feed your family”. Feel like sex? Dont worry about protection, you either don’t have to worry about paying child support or kids are like money in the bank.
Contrast that to a family that is lucky to gross $60K, have to pay rent or a mortgage, taxes, medical insurance, phone bill, etc. And they have to drag their asses out of bed and go to work…
The American “poor” have no reason to take care of anything they have and even less reason to break out of the poverty cycle.
Andy
So this is how these roaches live in a big house in my neighborhood. There’s one house where I see the fat, worthless baby momma and her little turds playing in the garage. House would cost about 2 grand per month to rent legitimately.
Spot on. Unfortunately this problem is only going to get worse.
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Yup they can’t get a job because they can’t afford all the daycare for the multi daddy kids running around. The dad is non existent and not paying child support so they lay around the house playing on their phones, watching cable and self medicating because life is so stressful.
Time for that “mysterious” electrical fire, to solve all your problems… :rolleyes:
I am out of the rental game. Only had 3 houses at most and sold the final one last year
We had some tenants like that at the begining (well maybe not that bad). Never had to gut a place, but replacing carpets/flooring, drywall patches, clearing junk, paying for a deep clean, etc…
I learned real quick that running a background and credit check significantly increases the odds of a decent tenant. it is worth the money. You can even charge an application fee to over the costs and return it if they end up renting the place. That will eliminate a lot of scumbags to even look at the place.
The Housing Authority in my state ¶ has to inspect any section 8 rentals and also you have to agree to follow their lease requirements. I never did this and just didnt accept any section 8.
We still have a detached one bedroom behind our current house. I was just going to make it a man/cave workshop, but someone we knows mom needed a place and she is a sweet lady so we rented it to her. She is the best tenant ever. That one is super easy because it is 50 yards away if anything is needed. its only about 600 square feet and in good shape so no major repair costs etc… It funds my IRA every year for now, I eventually do want my man cave though
It is a shame that it is what it is and that it is everywhere.
I saw it happen a block away and to me, it is almost as if they were jealous that they couldn’t earn it, so they needed to destroy it, because you, the owner didn’t 'earn" it.
Own about a dozen rental units. Never have, never will go Section 8.
We never have exactly been a capitalist society. Business subsidies extend back in to the early 1800’s at least, likely all the way to day one. Fairly sure welfare payments to foreign countries predate welfare payments to the stereotypical crack whore/layabout as well.
My grandparents had a couple of rentals they started out doing word of mouth so for the first 10 to 15 years it would be newlyweds they went to church with or relatives of people they knew well. Then for some reason they advertised in the paper and the perfect record fell to 50/50 and the bad 50 more than overshadowed the good.
Man, that sucks.
I almost ended up in that situation buying my first place. I was 20 and dumb, found one that I went through with a realtor. They didn’t say anything about it but it was a mess and the tenants didn’t even get off the couch while I was looking at it. I was going to rehab it for myself over a couple months. My attorney looked over the deal and said “STOP”. I couldn’t evict them once I took ownership so I’d have been guaranteed $800 income as long as they stayed there (Cook County, IL) but the mortgage was $1000 including property taxes. Horrible deal. No thanks.