Articles / duplexes - cons
Why you SHOULDN'T be doing it.
/ By Mj Gladding 10.19.06Ever seen the movie Pacific Heights?
It starred Matthew Modine and Melanie Griffith, before she had all that weird plastic surgery and inked herself of Antonio Banderas. Anyhow, the movie portrays a young couple buying their first home in San Francisco. Everything is perfect…the house is beautiful, much larger than what they could typically afford, because they have decided to rent out the other side to a "professional" played by Michael Keaton, who at first seems to be the model tenant.
Long story short, he seems like the perfect quiet tenant but what he really ends up doing is ruining their house and terrorizing them in the process. They are unable to get rid of him because tenants end up having more rights than landlords.
You want to buy a house because you are sick to death of renting, You want to establish a home, be able to paint your living room red or buy new kitchen appliances without having to ask the landlord's permission or surrender whatever you DO purchase to them when you move out. You want to be in control!
But you aren't quite ready financially. You have pretty good credit, a good job and so does your husband, but a single family mortgage would leave you a little strapped at the end of each month. You want to be able to save something. You keep hearing terms like "house poor" and that scares you. So what do you do?
Your real estate agent has been spouting about "multi-families" and "duplexes". On the surface this seems like the perfect way to own a home. You buy a duplex…rent one side and live in the other. Your tenant pays your mortgage for you. I heard this constantly when we were shopping for our first home. But the more and more we thought about it, we personally decided against it.
Did we really want the responsibility of being landlords? Did we really want to have to get up at 2 am in the winter and fix their running toilet? And then get up 3 hours later to plow the driveway for them to get out? Are we handy enough on our own to fix problems that arise, or are we going to be at the financial mercy of local vendors?These are the questions that you must ask yourself before you make this decision. There is so much more to being a landlord than collecting your rent and driving it to the bank.
It is not my intention to discourage the idea of purchasing a duplex. There
are people that have ability to fix things on their own and don't mind taking
care of the tenants. The idea that your mortgage can be paid by someone else
is fantastic. And someday if you want the privacy, you can always rent out
your portion of the duplex and then buy your own home.
As a consumer myself, I just want to educate people of the realities of being
a landlord. 'Caveat emptor' is the Latin phrase for "let the buyer beware" (my
college economics professor would be so proud). It is your responsibility
as a consumer to know your product before you buy it, whether it's a flat
screen TV or a duplex!
Get ALL the details, and check your "handyman" meter.
