"100% of people who do not save money do not have any!"--Dave Ramsey

[Xist]

I know better to expect Mom to ever follow through with what she says--or even acknowledge that she said one thing, but has since decided on a much stupider thing.

Today she is talking about selling the house, but not immediately.

Cool cool cool.

Zillow shows a 225-square-foot trailer in Apache Junction I can afford with my housing allowance.

I guess that I will stop looking for a place for all of us since the lunatic expects me to pay for it with money she knows I don't have.

[freebeard]

Zillow shows a 225-square-foot trailer in Apache Junction I can afford with my housing allowance.

I guess that I will stop looking for a place for all of us since the lunatic expects me to pay for it with money she knows I don't have.

I've got 256sq ft, it's comfortable for one, if they're not a hoarder [like me].

I hope you can move on to a new phase with minimal drama.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by freebeard

That was my brother's experience when he tried that path to riches. Plus he had to drive to the location in Oregon City.

Was the rental management company involved with the refrigerator?

Yes, the property manager was involved with the refrigerator replacement - that is why I pay them 10% - to manage the property and deal with the renters. Not just finding them, evicting them, and collecting rent - but managing all their little complaints and also minor to major repairs. This month it was a clogged toilet and the fridge.

For the fridge the renter called the property management office and said the fridge had stopped working. They sent a maintenance guy to confirm the fridge had stopped and do some basic troubleshooting. That is when they sent me a text as they need my authorization for anything over $500. The property manager said they could either call an appliance repair company that would change $120 to come out plus parts and labor for an estimate of about $400 or I could buy a new refrigerator from Lowes with free delivery and disposal of the old fridge. I chose a new fridge over spending 1/2 the price of a new fridge replace one that is more than a decade old.

The management company sends me an itemized receipt that includes the Lowes receipt and the charge for their maintenance guy. Looking at their web portal that fridge cost me $791 all in. (I forgot that the management company gets a 20% discount at Lowes)

There certainly are cheaper ways to do things if you self manage but you can't really do that from 2500 miles away and I didn't even entertain taking my father up on his offer to manage the property.

For example when I sold my super cheap and crappy electric stove that came with the house in Alabama on Craig's List for $50 it was purchased by a guy that self manages homes. He buys up cheap and crappy by still technically working appliances when they come up for sale and stores them so when he has an appliance failure (which is often as he buys crappy used appliances) he has spares ready to go. Which is fine if you don't value your time, don't travel away from home, and are fine with all the hassles that come from renting in the very bottom of the rental market.

A co-worker in Alabama did something similar and self managed because no management company would touch the properties she and her husband owned. ($30K shotgun shacks in North Birmingham) However, that was a full-time job on top of her full time job.

Originally Posted by Xist

Zillow shows a 225-square-foot trailer in Apache Junction I can afford with my housing allowance.

What do you mean by "housing allowance" Is that just your budget for housing or are you still getting benefits from the GI bill?

[Xist]

I was finally able to look up my benefits. 36 months are standard issue. I used 17 months and 9 days and have 18 months and 20 days left.

Summer and Christmas break total 78 days, so I figure that school is in session for 9.5 months a year, and I am going to run out of benefits!

The post 9/11 bill was approved while I was in Basic. I paid $100 a month for the first year of the Montgomery bill (in 2008) and cannot get that back until I use up the post-9/11 benefits.

[freebeard]

Zillow shows a 225-square-foot trailer in Apache Junction

I'm surprised you haven't posted pictures.

Being something of a trailer aficionado myeslf...

I'm curious if it has the roof and walls meet at a 90* corner with a seam or it's raidiused with the seam on the flat wall.

Any chance it's a Spartan Carousel?

[Xist]

You feel surprised that I didn't post my prospective next home on-line?

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3...84477212_zpid/

[freebeard]

You just seem more likely than I.

Although it looks like you Photoshopped the san-serif numerals in to throw people off the trailer. Well played.

Maybe 32-35ft long? My new neighbor has a handrail like that. It's a good signal whether she's home or not.

This is in my albums and ontopic.



This unit has been gone for years. The space is all gravel with a cedar fence and new tenant today.

This is the best roof ever, even Spartans and Airstreams are flat on top. I guess maybe in AZ you don't worry about rainfall?

It had the most incredible interior I've ever seen with curved plywood cabinets in a 1940s style. Somebody took it into a field and drove a Caterpillar over it, when they could've gotten thousands of dollars if they'd stripped the interior first. It died because the bathroom floor was soggy.

How's the plywood sublfoor. That's always the Achillees heel.

[Xist]

You didn't see the link to the listing under the picture?
I did not edit the picture, but someone definitely did.

I only shared it because I found significantly-less-terrible options, but since I found one empty lot in Mesa I wondered about buying a new mobile home and putting it there.

I am sure the neighbors would be fine with having a mobile home in the middle of site-built houses!

I clearly don't know the right search terms. I just got real estate sites showing listings for mobile homes and I don't think that any of them allow me to filter out homes with a land lease.

This is a mobile home?!


It says "1,344 square feet 1,700 square foot lot," but I have difficulty believing that the front yard is 356 square feet and the back yard is larger. Searching for "lease" didn't turn up anything, but the very last thing I can see without scrolling down is 55, so clearly we would face age discrimination. https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...6_M96870-34267

[JSH]

$885 a month for a travel trailer? Sounds steep - $8850 for the ten months you will be on campus.

Does your school have residency halls? Michigan state is $9926 a year room and board in the dorm. $3026 for the room and $6900 for food.

There is also the option of the conversion van in the school parking lot. Live, study, shower, eat on campus and just walk to the parking lot at night to sleep. A parking permit is generally pretty cheap - just move the van every now and then.

[Xist]

They don't have housing, just a link to homes for rent. They show a 1,300-square-foot house for $1,800 monthly, but looking at recent sales, one a little bigger sold for $412,000 on 12/20.

The rest of the sales I see in that ZIP are either two stories or much simpler-looking homes with asphalt shingles, while this has a tile roof, four rooflines, and other extras that make it look more expensive.

They are asking $400,000 for this smaller house and could the front be any simpler?

Zillow says the mortgage would be $2,122, the property tax would be $157, and home insurance would be $140.

That totals $2,419.

None of this makes any sense.

They also show 3-bedroom houses for $2,295 and $2,575 and the most-expensive one says "Call for Availability."

They also show 400-square-foot studios for $912 total.