To be honest, I had to laugh. First off, I don’t water the grass at ANY of my properties. Thankfully, the lawn is really just weeds but they provide a good ground covering for the beach sand that is most of Florida.

Second, the City of Palm Bay, by law, orders that if you own property, even if it’s vacant, you MUST pay for garbage collection and water/sewer base charges.

NOW, they want to make something else mandatory and charge you to connect to the system.

RIIIIIIIGHT!

In the broader scheme of things, I feel that using reclaimed water is a good thing for the environment but to make it something else to bill residents for? No!

In my opinion, the city of Palm Bay should start using reclaimed water for things like watering the city parks and baseball fields. I’m sure that would save them (and us) a bundle. Or better yet, make the reclaimed water potable and feed it back into the water system thereby reducing the water bills for city residents and businesses.

Post from: The Successful Landlord Blog

City of Palm Bay Reclaimed Water Survey

Actually what’s even more evil is that the county governments are threatening to raise the millage rate (thereby increasing the percentage of tax they collect) if the Florida state legislature passes a law forcing them to reduce property taxes due to screaming homeowners (see below), but I digress.

Now, theoretically if property values go down, so should the property taxes. Over the past two years there has been much weeping and gnashing of teeth from homeowners in Florida due to the “perfect storm” of rising property taxes and insurance costs (due to hurricanes) no pun intended.

I recently got the property tax proposals for the various single family rental properties we own and for the most part, the proposed tax amounts look like they will decrease next year. Not a whole lot, but at least they’re in keeping with the downward trend of housing prices in the area.

The only exception is one property which according to the proposed tax amount, is obviously in some special economic zone which is causing this property to be valued above market price…..or the Brevard County Property Appraiser is on crack. Either way, we will be disputing the county’s appraisal.

Even more sketchy, is that several contacts I have in the south Florida markets have let me know that the property values for their large apartment complexes have actually increased according to their property appraiser (Palm Beach County) to the tune of 20% – 40% and their downward trend in housing prices is sharper than ours. Now who’s on crack!?

Post from: The Successful Landlord Blog

County Property Appraisers On Crack In Florida?

Data on the chip will include not just the citizen’s name and address but also work history, educational background, religion, ethnicity, police record, medical insurance status and landlord’s phone number.

Ok Wait! The landlord’s phone number will be encoded in the data chip!? Is it just me or does anyone else think that this is just 1984 scary? Why does the landlord have to be involved?

But this is China you say. Not the good old US of A.

Oh Really? Well what about all the illegal immigration talk going on in the US right now. Like in this article recently in USA Today:

…So Barletta proposed a law that fines landlords for renting to illegal immigrants and punishes employers for hiring them. The City Council passed the measure, and Barletta signed it into law last month. To implement it, Barletta wants to require renters to go to City Hall and obtain a permit assuring landlords that they are in the USA legally. That would require a background check with the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Ok, so now the landlords have to do the dirty work of the Department of Homeland InSecurity and its minions? What in the hell people?!

Pretty soon they’ll have to change the words in the national anthem to:

…And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave
(if you have a chip in your arm and check out with our database.)

Post from: The Successful Landlord Blog

Landlords As Government Enforcers?

1) The notice DOES NOT tell you what the problem is, just that there is a violation with an extremely brief specific description (i.e.- To Wit: Grey commercial vehicle in residential area.) How about a better description and a copy of the city ordinance? They probably just like to get phone calls inquiring what the problem is. Duh! Efficiency in city government? Hello?

2) When you DO call the code enforcement officer to find out what the problem is, he sounds like he’s ready for a fight. Very gruff and short so you have to sweeten him up by being extra polite.

3) In my opinion, if you’re going to pass a city ordinance, ENFORCE IT and do it CITY WIDE!! But no, they wait until somebody complains ( like a neighbor) to then take action. Upon informing the code enforcement officer that that vehicle had been parked there for about a year, he tells me “Well then it’s been in violation for a year.” WTF?!

In my opinion, it’s the owner of the house directly next door. He’s trying to sell it because he’s basically flipping it and probably needs to sell it right away as the housing market continues to tank. Granted, he bought it when there were some strange deadbeat tenants living there. Case in point, they were using a portable commode as a planter…..IN THE FRONT YARD! Did I call code enforcement when I was trying to rent my newly fixed-up place? No. Whatever, my tenant will move his truck and the sale next door will only increase my property value. Thanks! Next!

Post from: The Successful Landlord Blog

Code Enforcement

So, last week I received two bills from the company that does trash collection and disposal for the City of Palm Bay where three of my properties are located. One was for about $41 which is the normal charge per property for 1 quarter (4 months) of service. The other bill was for about $260.

As a matter of background, The City of Palm Bay does not bill for trash collection on their water bills like EVERY OTHER CITY I have ever lived in. I had called Waste Management’s customer service department last year, upon receiving the first ever bills from them and asked them to send the bills directly to the rental properties, addressed to the tenants which they did.

After I received the bill for $260, I called Waste Management’s customer service department to find out what the deal was. They informed me that they had billed the tenants at the address in question and they had not paid……ever.

I then asked them to explain to me how was this my problem. The Waste Management customer service rep told me that ultimately, the property owner (me) was responsible for the bill and that a lien would be put on the property if it was not eventually paid.

Now, I can understand that if a company provides services under contract to a city, they need to be paid for their services. However, Waste Management continued to bill these tenants for 4 successive quarters and was never paid. They also never even tried to contact me to let me know about the situation.

As an aside, the tenants that were in this house were total dirt bags and stiffed a number of people including the city, the power company and me before they finally moved under threat of eviction.

Also, on a different property, they never transferred my name onto the account of that property and informed me that I was liable for the charges, including late charges, from the time that I purchased the house. WTF??!!

So basically, I called Waste Management to try to work something out on these accounts and to try to get some concession in the form of a discount or something.

I was told that no they could make no concessions on the account and I would have to pay all these bills within three months or I would again be accruing late charges. I asked the customer service rep to please explain to me how through a clerical error (not transferring a house into my name) and a collections department’s incompetency that I should have to pay all these charges.

She said, “I’m sorry Sir, that’s the policy.” I then asked to speak to her supervisor and after explaining the WHOLE story again, got them to cut one of the bills in half and they would attempt to collect the other amount from the tenants who didn’t pay. (I gave Waste Management the new address of the tenants)

City of Palm Bay, in their infinite wisdom, instead of putting trash collection services on the water bill, opted to pass an ordinance saying that trash collection by Waste Management of Melbourne is a mandatory service with the ultimate conflict resolution being to ability to place a lien on the property.

I’ll post the letter that I’m sending to all the members of the city council asking them what they were thinking at the time they passed this ordinance.

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Waste Management of Melbourne sucks.