This is a diary....a real diary which is describing the events of a day. No political message here, unless someone reads one in it. It fits the group "personal storytellers," and if you get to the end, also "Atheist in America"--I guess.
(We start with this email from a friend, whom I had asked for some advice on real estate investing)
Al
An interesting thing-for you I'm sure--happened during a sporting event, the US Open, this weekend, when NBC edited out "under God when broadcasting the Pledge of Allegiance. There was major controversy. I'd say interesting, but only to you, and some others, not to me.
(and then he responded to the real estate question)
For background, I have some units in a much nicer area than where you are looking, and one of my tenants was just put in the hospital Sat 4 AM, when a tenant at a neighboring apts, came after him with a hatchet, and was arrested-maybe the guy was psycho and didn't like gays, or just drinking too much?. Of course, I didn't get to find out about it in real time, but knowing you, you will be managing it yourself, for the exhilaration, and thus, keep a phone near your bed.
Look at neighborhood, walk around, see if its looking OK, for starters, then see about who lives there, the clientèle. Adults, kids, working people? Then look at the numbers, try to get under 10x Gross rents for the price you pay. Ask about graffiti,
Good luck,
Joe
(Here is my response to his email, that keep on going, until I decided to share it with my friends here on Dailykos) with the Email subject heading :
"Trust in God...Maybe"
Joe,
Let me explain something. Both Sheila (my wife) and I are recovering Property-holics. That means we are never cured, but are resisting our impulses. We got the bug soon after we were married, and were cruising around in the country and went to an open house. When you live in Manhattan, the idea of land, as much as your own acre becomes intoxicating. We were hooked.
Hundreds of houses that we looked at, many agents we wore out, but we also bought. The first one 26 acres and a pond, with a house built in 1840.....and the experience was a joy. Yet, my temperament would not allow pure pleasure to infuse my soul. I focused on what was wrong, such as the din of a race track a couple miles away. But we met some people we never would have known, and it enriched our lives.
Two more homes in that area (right near Berquist's) and then our condo in South Carolina. It was an adventure, and also a fantasy that with a new house comes a new life.
Now, a bit of that addiction always creeps into any thinking about real estate, even when we try to think of it as an investment. It's the equivalent of pot, coke and even a little LSD for a while, and then the high wears off, and what is left is a realization that I would be a landlord, who owns property not bought at 1990 prices but today's, with the ability to make a fair return only if I considered each tenant as a revenue center. But these revenue centers are families who face sickness, loss of jobs, and being attacked by an ax wielder.
If we were in financial need, then so what, it would be us or them, and I would do what had to be done if it seems like a good financial deal. But we aren't in that financial position, and starting in Real Estate now isn't going to change my life. It won't make us rich, but it could make us miserable.
Now, about the title of this long essay, "Trust in God...Maybe" Yesterday we were looking at property in Dana Point. It was a long day, and the Dolly Parton look alike agent, fun and a bit ditsy, had taken us to some rather depressing condos. As we were walking to our cars, she said, "My God, I left my car keys at one of the condos" So back we went. It wasn't at the first...or the second. It looked like we were going to have to drive her home, a distance away, since we couldn't just abandon her. Then I said after the second condo, "Can you check that it's not on your body somewhere" She nodded, and started to pat herself, and then as she reached her chest, deep in her ample cleavage, she laughed, and pulled out the car keys, complete with the attached remote transponder. There was quite a bit of room there.
It was late, we stopped off for a fish fry dinner at the docks, and then decided to drive past a few properties she had described. We were using the new GPS, a complex TomTom model with two way voice communication, but not too refined in getting location and directions right. Sheila was the navigator, and it was a bit tense, as I tried to explain how to operate it; but I hadn't mastered it, and the damn voice got some things wrong. As we were driving along Capistrano Avenue, with the GPS announcing "make a right turn-now" a couple hundred feet before the corner, and Sheila and I at odds, I got to the corner, the one I figured out it must be in spite of the damn GPS, and I turned right.
I turned right as I should have.... except I hadn't noticed one thing, the light had turned red. I hadn't even slowed down, and as I passed the curb, a man, maybe my age, a bit disheveled, looked at me, not in anger, but something else. I missed hitting him by a foot. Had he stepped off the curb a couple of milliseconds sooner, he would have been crippled or dead.
Why were we spared this tragedy? I felt like thanking someone, showing some appreciation for a break that I surely didn't earn. It's times like this that something is missing being an atheist . There is so much of life out of my control, that it would be nice to believe that it's not all random, that theres a bigger picture, even if I can't understand what it is.
Anyhow, I thank God that I didn't hit the man; and also that i don't need to be a landlord for people who are a paycheck away from the streets at this stage of my life.
I guess I have to keep writing these long essays to keep myself busy.