*Schools*
Hambrick Elementary
Stone Mountain Middle
Stone Mountain High

Great 4 bdrm home on a basement 4 rent.

4 Bedroom Basement Home For Rent

This lawrenceville home is available for rent in August 2010. Featuring a spacious formal living and dining, eat in kitchen and half bath, all on the main level. 3 bedrooms are upstairs including master suite, along with a large bonus room.  The finished basement features a private separate bedroom, which can be used for gym, office, baby room, a traditional bedroom, or whatever your heart desires, in addition the rest of the basement has a 2nd family room, and a full bathroom. This home is located on a large corner lot with a completely fenced back yard. Great location.  This truly wont last long. Call Call 770-685-6968 for more information.  

When using a realtor that specializes in rental listings you are using a one stop shopping resource that costs you nothing upfront except maybe an application fee.  You tell them what you want, they findit for you, do all the background work to ensure the homes are still available, schedule showing appointments based on your schedule and then voila! You are looking at houses that are available at that moment. 

So lets look at some scenarios.  We have 3 women looking for a rental house, not an apartment, Betty, Julie and Cookie (all fictitious).  Betty is searching for a home on her own, Julie is using the web, and Cookie is using an agent:

• Betty knows she needs to move soon, within the next 60 – 90 days, so she decides to drive around one Sunday afternoon in areas that she likes and soon, she sees a home with a for rent sign in the yard.  She pulls over, calls the owner and gets a voicemail.  She leaves her number and continues driving.  She sees another home and calls the number off that sign and gets the homeowner, who gives her the rent and number of bedrooms, but the rent is more than she’s wanting to pay and there’s only 3 bedrooms and she wants a 4 bedroom.  She repeats this process with no success and decides to stop by a drug store and pick up a paper to look at the want ads. She soon realizes that the area she’s looking in might be too expensive for her so she circles all the properties in her price range and starts to make calls while in the drugstore parking lot.  Most of them are all voice mails so she leaves a message with those.  She also speaks to a few Realtors as well as homeowners and sets a few appointments.  She’s able to view a few of those homes that same day so she drives over to the first home on her list.  While she’s driving she starts to get call backs from all those messages.  “I can’t remember which home you’re talking about, I called so many today, can I call you back?” she tells most of the call backs.  She reaches the first home and views the home with the owner.  The bedrooms are too small, there’s only one garage, and the home looks a little run down.  The listings in the newspaper didn’t have any photos, so she’s feeling like she wasted a drive on that one.  She leaves andgoes to the other property, but realizes it’s just too far from where she’d like to be so she looks around that house and told the owner she’d think about it but she knows she’ll never call back.  She decides to drive home and return the calls to all the agents and owners who called back.  She spends at least another 45 minutes calling and setting more appointments.  It’s now after 6 p.m. and she’s beginning to realize this is going to take some time.  She’s sure glad she started early but this is going to be frustrating.
• Julie needs to find a home to rent so she decides to go online and do a search one Wednesday night.  She knows she needs 4 bedrooms,  in a specific city so she enters all her criteria and starts looking.  She finds quite a few that she likes and starts calling on them.  Quite a bit of them are no longer available, so many people are telling her “We JUST rented this home a few hours/days/weeks ago”.  She’s an hour into making calls and is now getting calls back from some of the messages she left.  She sets appointments to view these homes on a Saturday afternoon.  On her first appointment she hated the neighborhood. Nice house, but she couldn’t get past the neighborhood.  Such a shame too, because the home was her favorite from the photos, andshe thought the bedrooms were small.  She drove to her second appointment.  The owner was 30 minutes late.  She looked at the home but she was still upset about waiting.  Not bad, but she decided she’d look at more before she made a decision on that one.  She took a copy of the owner’s application just in case.  She drove to her 3rd property.  The realtor showed her the home and she loved it, but the realtor made her aware that 2 applications came in on Thursday and Friday so hers would be 3rd in line IF those other applications didn’t pan out.  Disappointing.  She took the online application website info from that agent and went on to her 4th appointment.  She was late.  She didn’t realize that she was running behind when she got there and the owner wasn’t there.  She called the owner and they rescheduled to show the home to her the following day. RATS! She really liked that one too.  She drove by the home just to see if she’d like the neighborhood and it was decent.  She’ll have to wait to see that one tomorrow.  She now has 30 minutes to kill before her 5th and final appointment so she drives to that house to see the neighborhood andto see if there are any other rental signs around the neighborhood.  She waits for the last appointment and the realtor arrives andshows her the home.  It’s not bad but the realtor informs her that the owner wants it rented this month and Julie needs to move in the next 60 days.  The realtor tells her that they are not willing to hold it for that long.  She leaves that appointment and she’s frustrated.
• Cookie  got a referral for a really good realtor that specializes in listing rental homes.  She contacts that realtor and sets an appointment on Friday to meet with her.  The realtor asks her to bring her pay stubs and employment information so she can pre qualify her. She arrives at the appointment and the realtor welcomes her to her office.  After they get settled, the realtor asks a few questions about her needs and Cookie lets her know that she’s looking for a 4 bedroom in a certain price range and area, nothing more than 4 years old and with a bedroom on the main for her aging grandmother who is staying with her.  The realtor qualifies her with her income and credit right there in her office and she has about 15 listings in that area and she shows Julie those listings first.  There is one that Julie really likes that fits all her criteria and the realtor informs her that it’s still available and there are no applications presently on that property.  She also shows cookie a few more listings that are held by other brokers that fit her criteria perfectly.  Cookie finds 4 more properties that she likes.  The realtor calls on all four properties and find out that 3 of them are still available with no applications.  The realtor also finds out what their application requirements are so that they’ll know exactly what to do if  Cookie likes any of those homes.  The realtor also secures the showing instructions from the listing agents and also finds out that there are 1 of the 3 homes that has a tenant still in the property, and it requires an appointment which the co-op agent will confirm for them.  The realtor gives the co-op agent her cell number to call her when she’s confirmed that appointment.   Now they get in their cars to look at the 3 homes at their leisure.  The realtor shows her listing 1st and Cookie really likes that one.  Then they go to the other 2 homes and Cookie likes those too.  There are a few things that she didn’t like but they weren’t major, she decided mentally she could live with it.  While they are in the 2nd home the realtor gets a call from the co-op agent who tells them that they can view the house anytime before 5 since the home is on lock-box and the renters are currently not there.  They proceed to that final home and it’s the winner for Cookie.  It has everything she needs and more in a great neighborhood and the yard is fenced which wasn’t even on her list but is a huge bonus.  The current tenants are moving because they are relocating to another state in the next 30 days and they’ve kept the home in great condition.   The Realtor and Cookie go back to the office to complete the application.  Cookies application was approved and she gave the deposit check to her realtor.

OK, so which person would you like to be?  The one with or without a realtor?  Give me your feedback.  Keep in mind that while these individuals are all fictitious, these scenarios are a compilation of all the issues I’ve heard about over the years working with tenants.  Send us your scenarios, we’d love to hear from you.

It’s hard enough renting when you really want to own.  And most tenants will rent a house instead of an apartment to get as much benefits of living in a single family home as possible….no noise; a somewhat private backyard for your use only; no one above or below you. But tenants beware….Landlord foreclosures are on the rise.   Along with all the other foreclosures out there, rental houses that are owned by private owners are falling into the foreclosure trap faster than you can say….foreclosure! 

What’s the reason for this?  In the beginning of the biggest mortgage meltdown – ever!, many homeowners could not sell their home for this number 1 reason – they owed more than the home was worth.  This meant that troubled homeowners, owners that had moved up into another home or moved away from the state chose an alternative to selling – Renting.  But what those homeowners may not have been aware of prior to renting was that rents were not matching the mortgage payments.  Homeowners were faced with a choice of holding out until they found a tenant willing and able to pay rent equivalent to their mortgage payment, which in the current market may take a long while; or the homeowner could rent at fair market rent value and pay the difference out of their pockets, just to minimize the full mortgage pain on a second home while trying to maintain their good credit.

The issue is this; if the owner struggles to keep up for any reason, and find they cannot pay the full mortgage, even if you’ve paid your rent, this could be a problem. All it may take is a repair that the homeowner cannot pay for in addition to the dollars they have to put with your rent to pay their mortgage, and the path to a foreclosure may begin. Finally, the owners are always reluctant to tell anyone, hoping that they can get it all sorted out and back on track. When they can’t, and the home forecloses, the renter is almost always surprised.

So how can you protect yourself from this disaster? Well, the old standard rings true…prevention is better than cure.  Here are 7 things to do to protect you from a Landlord foreclosure, or at least being surprised by one:

1. This one’s going to be hard, but you should try to negotiate this one statement as part of the terms of your lease, that the Landlord will need to show monthly or quarterly statements of their current mortgage account.  Keep in mind we live in a computer and color printer era.  I’m not saying any Landlord would do what-I-am-not-mentioning, but ….
2. Sign up for a service like Lemon Landlord.com. When a renter doesn’t pay his rent, everyone knows. When a landlord doesn’t pay his mortgage, nobody knows… until its too late.  Lemon Landlord.com will produce the foreclosure status of any property (residential/commercial) in the US within seconds. And the property can be monitored so that if a Notice of Default is filed, an email alert is sent out. 
3. Make sure your deposit is held by a third party.  Strangely enough, there are some renters that want to deal with a private owner and not a realtor, but a realtor does have some benefits.  If your realtor is managing the property, have them hold the deposit.  Ask them to add language in the lease contract that if the owner defaults on the mortgage while you are still current on your rent, that you are entitled to your deposit back.  If the owner has it in their personal account, and the house has foreclosed, chances are, they wont have that money and you’ll have to sue in small claims court to get it back. Sounds simple enough, right?  You could go through all that, and win the judgement, but there is no guarantee you’ll get paid.  More than likely you’ll have to spend more money, time and energy to actually collect the money. Many renters find that it’s not worth the hassle and just walk away.  Again, prevention…..cure.
4. Run, don’t walk –  to the nearest rental where the owner has no mortgage lien against the property.   This means the owner owns it free and clear.  This doesn’t mean that you’ll never risk a Landlord foreclosure.  The owner could take an equity loan out against the property after you’ve moved in and lived there a while and you may never know, and if they don’t pay it, then, here we go again. But the chances of that happening are lower with an owner that originally has no loan balance on the property.
5. Keep your eye on the mail.  While I am not advocating you open anyone’s mail (that’s against the law) other than your own, I am saying to pay attention.  If letters are coming from an attorney to the owner on a frequent basis, chances are those are foreclosure notices.  Pick up the phone and try to find out what’s going on. 
6. Don’t contact the owner’s bank to find out if the property is in foreclosure status.  If you call the bank, you’ll get nowhere.  They are not allowed to divulge any information about the owner’s loan status to anyone other than the owner, or anyone the owner authorizes in writing.  You’ll find out more from the bank as to what you can do if the house has actually foreclosed and now belongs to said bank.
7. Don’t always expect the realtor to tell you when the owner is in foreclosure status.  Most times they don’t know either.  The same way the landlord didn’t inform you, the same way they may not tell the realtor.   Maybe you may want to ask your realtor if they’ve subscribe to a service like Lemon Landlord.com.  If they have then they’ll get that notification e-mail in the event a notice of foreclosure is filed against the property.

If you do find that you are in the home and it has foreclosed, contact the bank (because they will definately send you, the occupant,  a letter).  Find out what program they have for renters.  Some Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac foreclosures will allow the tenant to stay in the property and continue to pay rent while the property is on the market for sale.  While this is not always an ideal situation, it does give you a little more time.   Some banks will even reimburse your moving expense up to a certain amount providing you leave the property in decent condition.

Finally, I am not a lawyer, and because of the society we live in I have to include this small disclaimer.  Non of this article constitutes legal advice.  If you find you need legal advice, please consult an attorney.

1. Budget for trash pickup.  When you live in an apartment, trash drop-off service is located on the premises, and included in your rent. Not so with a house.  When you rent a house and sign up for trash service the trash company will provide you with a trash can so there’s no need to buy one.  As long as you have the service, you’ll have the can.  If you need additional cans, then you’ll have to pay for those.  Trash service prices vary, but they are usually between $50 – $70 and normally paid on a quarterly basis.  If you can, pay for the year to eliminate one more annoying bill to remember.
2. Budget for water.  Tons of apartment complexes include water in the rent.  Renting a house from a private owner most likely will not.  This will be a new bill for many first time house renters.
3. Budget for lawn maintenance.  Some owners will maintain the lawn  while others will not.  If an owner does not, then cutting, fertilizing and maintaining the lawn will be your responsibility.  If you live in a subdivision, and you don’t maintain the lawn or control the weeds, the Home owner’s Association will send a notification or fine to the homeowner, which will be passed on to the tenant.  Why would you want to maintain a lawn and keep weeds down on a property you don’t own? Because weeds grown faster than grass.  If you have a weed free lawn you can cut it every 2 weeks in the summer, every 3 -4  weeks in the winter when it’s dormant.  With weeds, you’ll be cutting much more regular to keep the lawn low.  Save yourself the headache and do it right.
4. Association Fees.  Some owners may pass this annual fee on to you if you require the use of the pool, clubhouse and tennis court.  This fee usually occurs at the beginning of the year and is paid annually.  Normal costs range from $200 on up, depending on the community.
5. Budget for home maintenance.  Renting a house will usually require a much larger deposit than an apartment.  Which means that if and when you move out, and, for example your carpet was not maintained and it needs shampooing, the Owner will decuct cleaning or replacement costs from your deposit.  You can protect your deposit by making sure your walls are painted and all holes are patched, sanded and painted; shampoo your carpets at least quarterly, and try to leave the home free of debris when you move. 
6. Budget for a larger electric/gas bill.  Your rental house will probably be bigger than your apartment unless you’re downsizing.  If you’re used to paying $100 per month for electric in an 800 square foot apartment, your bill will go up right along with your square footage as it will cost more to heat and cool a larger space.
7. Realize it will take more to keep it clean.  That gorgeous house with the 2 story family room and hardwood floors that is twice as large as your last rental is going to require a little extra elbow grease to keep clean.  I can’t tell you how many customers I have that ask for more space and then complain that the home is harder to keep clean.  Be careful what you wish for…

If you have budgeted and prepared for at least these 7 items, along with your rent and utilities, you’re on the path to a stress free rental.  What could be better than that?

The biggest gripe for any would-be renter searching for a home is this…”I hate having to pay a $50 application fee for each property I apply for!”  So why does each company charge? Well for starters the documents involved in an application costs money, and the job verifications and rental history costs time which always equal money in business.  When you apply for a rental, your a)credit report is almost always required, and there is a fee for this; b) there is also the time to verify your employment and rental history and c) your criminal background check.  Your application will involve at least these three things.  That’s one of the reasons why an application will vary from property to property.  Most companies will also outsource these tasks which creates the price variation in application fees. 

So what do you do to avoid paying for an application over and over again? Read the five tips below.

1. Always find out in advance what a property manager’s qualification requirements are.  Knowledge is power, if they require specific things and you don’t fit those requirements, you’ve just saved yourself some money if you didn’t apply for the property because you knew in advance what those requirements were.
2. Make sure you make enough income to qualify.  Most property managers will want you to make at least 3 times the amount you will pay in rent. So if you are looking for an $800 property, you need to earn at least $2400 per month to qualify for that property.  If you make less than that, you risk not qualifying and having to apply somewhere else. 
3. Get a copy of your credit report in advance.  You are entitled to 1 free credit report each year from each of the bureaus.  Or you can get all three credit reports with your credit score. Get an Equifax 3-in-1 Credit Report Now!  If you haven’t seen your report in a while, you should get a copy to see what is on there.  You’d be amazed at the amount of errors that may be on your report.  If you can correct them prior to applying for a rental, you can save yourself a lot of money and headache.  In a lot of cases, you only get one chance to make a first credit impression.  If there is an error on your report that is affecting your scores and history, you can’t tell the Property manager to “hold on while I go and fix that….OK, pull the report again!”  Not going to happen.
4. Be upfront and honest about your credit challenges.  See number 1.  When you are asking what the requirements are, if you know you’ve had an eviction, but it was years ago, mention that in advance.  Some property owners will still rent the property to you if you put down a larger deposit. If they are still prepared to move forward with your application after you’ve given them an idea of what to expect, then give it a try.
5. Make sure all your information is correct on your application.  Seems simple enough but if you put an incorrect phone number for a job verification or your previous landlord’s number is wrong and the verification process cannot be completed because they cannot reach them to verify your information, you may get denied.  Make sure you have all your info correct.  If your previous landlord was a private owner and not an apartment complex, make sure you have your canceled rent checks for at least the last 6 – 12 months as an alternate form of proof of rent checks.

Hopefully these tips will help you eliminate having to apply to several places and pay each one an application fee.  It can save you money at a time when you really need to.

But what about those of you that are renting a house?  It feels nice to live in a house, not an apartment, but wouldn’t it be nice to own it? What would one need to do if they are interested in buying one of these fabulous foreclosure deals that we keep hearing about?

I know I’ve blogged about the highlights of Rent-to-Own homes, but I’ve never really given a plan on how to actually go about it.  Well, it would take me a while to go over all the details.  As a real estate broker I can easily discuss it with you.  I’m pretty sure I can answer all your questions , faster than you can fire them at me!  Come to think of it, I can do a series of blogs based on steps to take to get to the ownership rainbow.  Or I could write a book about it. 

Writing a book would be hard, writing a series is a little easier but who wants to wait for a week to see what the next step is? Finally, if everyone called for a face to face meeting, there wouldn’t be enough hours in the day.  I can, however, suggest a book that I feel gives you all

the pertinent details about renting a home and then purchasing, and the steps involved. 

Robert Irwin’s Rent to Own  is one of the most complete guide to renting to own.  It covers everything, and is a complete step by step guide on how to go about the renting to own process, including tips about credit, contracts, downpayment from rent, and whether you can really afford it.

It really is nicer to own your home, but as we see in the current mortgage meltdown, it is better to be fully prepared, no doubt about it.  A first time buyer who has never lived in a house wouldn’t fully understand what it takes to run a house, or what the real costs are.  My new mantra is “be prepared”,  which means not going into a major purchase like buying a home, just because everyone else you know is doing it. 

I will do today what others wont so I can do tomorrow what others can’t.

Powerful words!

There are many questions about credit repair and the process involved.  “Can I do it myself”, “What happens when I pay off a bill?”  Since there seems to be lots of myths and misinformation, we hope to help clear that up today.  If you’re truly ready to give it a go, take a look at the most common myths below, and find the answers that can get you on the right track today.

The Benefits

1. You’ll only have to move once.  Unlike living in an apartment and searching for a home, a rent-to-own purchase does not involve giving notice and coordinating a purchase closing with a rental move-out.  You get to buy and stay in the home with a rent-to-own. 
2. Learn everything about the home before you buy.  There are things you will never know about a house until you live in it.  Not even an inspection can tell you how much noise you will hear from an adjacent room, whether the garage door will wake you up at night because your master bedroom is directly over it.  If you’re a 1st time home buyer, you just don’t know about these small details.  How noisy is the HVAC unit going to be? Is the closet really as large as you thought.  When you live in the home you’ll experience all the negatives and positives of the home;
3. Build up down payment equity.  With rent-to-own, you can negotiate that part of the rent will be credited or applied to the purchase price or down payment, which will allow you to have some equity when you’re ready to close. 
4. Valuable time to repair your credit.  If good credit is blocking you from buying a home a rent-to-own program can give you time to Clean Up Your Credit Reportso that you can purchase; You can pay off charged off items, dispute erroneous credit issues, and get your score and credit where you need it to be to purchase.

The Negatives:

1. There are no refunds.  If you don’t buy, you lose your equity, your rent-to-own deposit, etc.  That extra you pay on your rent each month that will go towards your down payment you stand to lose.  So be prepared.  Maybe you’ll want to sign a rent-to-own agreement on your lease renewal.  At that point, you’ll be sure you want to purchase the home.
2. Make sure the owner is current on the mortgage. Seems obvious, but there are a lot of homeowners that are renting because they can’t sell their home, or may not be able to afford the mortgage payments any more.  Make sure your Landlord is current on their mortgage payments.  It is hard, but not impossible to get back any deposit funds if you are paying the rent and the owner defaults and forecloses on their loan.  Include a provision in the lease that the owner must show proof of a current mortgage each month.  Have a 3rd party like a real estate brokerage or attorney hold the deposit until the deed is done.