Should we sell our DC rental?

[Anonymous]

I own a Capitol Hill rowhouse that used to be our primary residence. We moved many years ago (way beyond cap gains limitation) and have rented ever since. 2.9% mortgage so we are able to keep rent pretty low.

I’m trying to figure out if we should sell or hold. We had to pump $30k into it due to delayed renter maintenance and it will take time to recoup that in rent profits.

I live in another HCOL area now and having some extra cash on hand would be nice due to job instability and a very, very high mortgage in my primary residence.

Thoughts on DC market and whether we’d be better served in continuing to rent, or selling for a modest profit? We could also pursue a 1031 but with interest rates today it seems hard to get that to pencil…

[Anonymous]

I'd avoid the 1031 in your situation if you would need to finance.

We are renting out a property and are on the fence about this -- we are leaning toward selling and pulling the cash out. Especially given how the market could cool (or worse). But in this economy it makes some sense to me to be diversified and have money in real estate. So I don't think there is an obvious answer.

[Anonymous]

I would sell. Your rowhouse is always going to need additional maintenance. It sounds like it has appreciated quite a bit already so get out before something else breaks.

[Anonymous]

I would sell. It will simply your life.

[Anonymous]

I’d sell. The only problem is that depreciation recapture tax is a big hit. But what are you gonna do?

[Anonymous]

I would sell because of how you phrased this: "We had to pump $30k into it due to delayed renter maintenance and it will take time to recoup that in rent profits."

Did you expect your renters to maintain the property? They didn't delay the maintenance -- you did. And this 30k you've spent on delayed maintenance is not some unforeseen expense. Maintenance should be built into your business costs as a landlord such that you should have already been "recouping" the costs of that maintenance all along through the rent.

You don't understand what it means to be a landlord or to own an investment property. You should be maintaining the property all along and charging a rental fee that covers maintenance costs as they occur instead of letting it fall into disrepair and suddenly having to fix it all at once between tenants. It sounds like you live out of state and don't employ a management company for the rental.

Sell it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would sell because of how you phrased this: "We had to pump $30k into it due to delayed renter maintenance and it will take time to recoup that in rent profits."

Did you expect your renters to maintain the property? They didn't delay the maintenance -- you did. And this 30k you've spent on delayed maintenance is not some unforeseen expense. Maintenance should be built into your business costs as a landlord such that you should have already been "recouping" the costs of that maintenance all along through the rent.

You don't understand what it means to be a landlord or to own an investment property. You should be maintaining the property all along and charging a rental fee that covers maintenance costs as they occur instead of letting it fall into disrepair and suddenly having to fix it all at once between tenants. It sounds like you live out of state and don't employ a management company for the rental.

Sell it.

I think it is you who does not "understand what it means to be a landlord or to own an investment property."

Who maintains the property, with regard to any particular maintenance, can be covered by the lease. And it is not unheard of for tenants to have maintenance duties.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would sell because of how you phrased this: "We had to pump $30k into it due to delayed renter maintenance and it will take time to recoup that in rent profits."

Did you expect your renters to maintain the property? They didn't delay the maintenance -- you did. And this 30k you've spent on delayed maintenance is not some unforeseen expense. Maintenance should be built into your business costs as a landlord such that you should have already been "recouping" the costs of that maintenance all along through the rent.

You don't understand what it means to be a landlord or to own an investment property. You should be maintaining the property all along and charging a rental fee that covers maintenance costs as they occur instead of letting it fall into disrepair and suddenly having to fix it all at once between tenants. It sounds like you live out of state and don't employ a management company for the rental.

Sell it.

I think it is you who does not "understand what it means to be a landlord or to own an investment property."

Who maintains the property, with regard to any particular maintenance, can be covered by the lease. And it is not unheard of for tenants to have maintenance duties.

I don't think $30K worth of repairs is simple "tenant responsibility maintenance", but OP would have to share details.

[Anonymous]

OP - do you have a tenant in the rental now?

[Anonymous]

The bad thing about real estate is you can't really manage your capital gains. You sell the whole thing all at once unlike a REIT or stocks where you can sell smaller amounts of shares. When you have to sell a big asset all at once you get killed on federal and local capital gains tax. Not to mention selling expenses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP - do you have a tenant in the rental now?

Same question. If you’re in between tenants, this is the time to sell. Otherwise sell as soon as your current tenant leaves. If possible you don’t want to take on someone new and have the possibility of having to evict a tenant looming over a future sale.

[Anonymous]

We own a few rental properties in DC and I think you should perhaps increase your rent if it’s low like you said and not sell right now. Prices are falling, but rentals are still going well. It’s possible that given the high interest rates, people will prefer to rent over buying.

We don’t own anything in Capitol Hill so I am not sure how the rental market is over there. We rent our townhome on U street for 6k/month and we are a little below average.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We own a few rental properties in DC and I think you should perhaps increase your rent if it’s low like you said and not sell right now. Prices are falling, but rentals are still going well. It’s possible that given the high interest rates, people will prefer to rent over buying.

We don’t own anything in Capitol Hill so I am not sure how the rental market is over there. We rent our townhome on U street for 6k/month and we are a little below average.

This.

[Anonymous]

Given your situation of job instability coupled with a large mortgage, I would sell and bulk up your liquidity. It doesn't sound like you're making a huge profit renting, and you're only going to have more maintenance costs to come.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would sell because of how you phrased this: "We had to pump $30k into it due to delayed renter maintenance and it will take time to recoup that in rent profits."

Did you expect your renters to maintain the property? They didn't delay the maintenance -- you did. And this 30k you've spent on delayed maintenance is not some unforeseen expense. Maintenance should be built into your business costs as a landlord such that you should have already been "recouping" the costs of that maintenance all along through the rent.

You don't understand what it means to be a landlord or to own an investment property. You should be maintaining the property all along and charging a rental fee that covers maintenance costs as they occur instead of letting it fall into disrepair and suddenly having to fix it all at once between tenants. It sounds like you live out of state and don't employ a management company for the rental.

Sell it.

I think it is you who does not "understand what it means to be a landlord or to own an investment property."

Who maintains the property, with regard to any particular maintenance, can be covered by the lease. And it is not unheard of for tenants to have maintenance duties.

While that can be true in some cases, the tenant bias in DC landlord-tenant law makes these provisions all but unenforceable. You can write it into the lease, but if your tenant does none of the agreed upon maintenance, good luck either suing them to do it or evicting them -- either way you will lose more in attorney's fees than if you just did it yourself.

There are situations where tenant-assigned maintenance can work, but obviously is OP got to the point where they needed 30k in "deferred maintenance," this wasn't one of them. Especially if OP is renting from another state and doesn't have a management company who checks in on the property and deals with the tenant, it's just not going to work here.