Hello folks,\nCan someone share a Trampoline Liability Waiver with me? I am listing a rental property. The landlord has a trampoline in the backyard. He is ok with tenants using it, but he need tenants sign a waiver if they do play with it. Can someone point out to me, where I can get this waiver form? Or, if you have one, can you share? My email is JacobLeeagent@gmail.com.\nthank you so much\nLee

This definitely is an issue clients should have qualified legal counsel on before making a decision and taking action. Trampolines have a history of causing neck/spinal injuries that lead to huge lawsuits. I am not qualified to provide any opinion on this but it has been my experience that your clients will find out they cannot completely assign their risk to the tenant with a form. They will likely be advised to refer to the standard TAR Residential Lease that prohibits any activity that causes an increase in insurance premiums - including trampolines. The Broker/Lawyer Committee probably included this specific language after researching the issue of trampolines, water ground slides, etc. and decided these are high risk activities best left for homeowners to deal with their own insurance companies, not to be negotiated as part of a lease.

Price range of $100K-$400K per deal\nTargeting 3-9 deals in the next 18-24 months\nWilling to look at properties within an one hour drive of I-10/610 West

First step is to meet with your agent/broker and determine what are your specific objectives. At any time there are 400-500 multifamily properties listed on HAR and in my 44 years of experience, if you listed them all in order of best to worst, the best 5-10 would be absolute bargains and the worst 5-10 would be total disasters. A good agent/broker can help you determine not just the best areas for you, but how much rehab you are willing to endure in a purchase, the relative age/condition of the property will determine the ongoing repair and maintenance you will have to provide. The rental history can be normal for the market or the property may have underperformed due to poor management. I have worked with investors for 44 years and finding the best properties to build your portfolio is a function of assessing your goals and formulating the optimum plan to achieve them through real estate investments. However, one thing remains constant, because of favorable tax laws and low interest rates, this is the best time to be taking an aggressive position in real estate investments. \n\nGreg Buchanan, Broker/Owner Houston Strategic Real Estate Group\n 832 741-6018

The seller is obligated to deliver the document to the buyer within 5 days of having an effective contract to purchase. If he does not do so in time, but delivers it late, the buyer’s right to cancel the contract remains alive, until such time as the buyer receives the document and has ample opportunity to review it and respond. Nevada law requires the document to be delivered not later than 10 days prior to the close of escrow. However, proper procedure (and the contract) says the SRPD should be delivered to the buyer within 5 days.

REALTORS are not attorneys and cannot provide legal advice or opinions. Our only authority is to assist clients in completing promulgated forms and making sure the right forms are made available to the client for a transaction. All of the other answers provide information from the Property Code, but are not qualified legal advice or opinions. We can advise a client when the Sellers Disclosure is required and exempt, but what the client\'s possible consequences are for failure to comply with the Property Code is a legal question and the client should be referred to a competent attorney every time to be properly advised of their rights and responsibilities. Failure to do so can harm the client and not be in their best interest. The question does not clarify whether the transaction is ongoing, complete or what - so the situation can be different in all cases. If a seller fails to provide the Seller Disclosure in an ongoing transaction, and the seller is not exempt, the client should always be advised to seek legal counsel. After getting legal advice, they may choose to proceed with the purchase anyway because it is such a good opportunity, but they must know all the legal consequences to them and the seller before they make that decision, and REALTORS are not qualified to give that advice.

Dealing with a client that has power of attorney would be the same as if writing and agreement with the owner of the property?

A POA is a legal document and this is a legal question. REALTORS are not attorneys and are not qualified to provide answers to legal questions. Anytime a POA is involved in a real estate transaction, the agents must seek competent legal counsel on how that may\\will affect the transaction. Fortunately, title companies have good real estate attorneys and title should be opened on the property right away to get you some legal answers on how the listing needs to be drawn, how any contracts can be accepted, and closed. These are certainly important legal questions because if you even have a signature done wrong by the person appointed by the POA you can create real problems for your transaction and your client. Some owners do a POA just for convenience because they are traveling or are not available to attend meetings/closings due to sickness. Other owners may have a POA in place because they have been incarcerated or determined to be legally incompetent by a court. All of these factors matter and only a competent attorney can advise you on the proper way to proceed and provide good service to your client. Also, keep your correspondence, phone conversation transcripts with the attorneys, etc. in the file because this is your primary defense in the event problems develop sometime later - even after the transaction.

I am the listing agent. The buyer terminated their contract, and on the same day I received another offer that my seller wants to accept. Am I required to change the status since I will immediately be under contract again?

You must change status back to active, then to pending (or option pending), so you can show the new contract information. The MLS system is only as good as the information that gets put into it and it is the responsibility of all members to not take short cuts but keep all information as current and complete as possible. It is our most important tool to do business.

We built/purchased our home in November of last year. When we did, the subdivision claimed to be part of a MUD district but could provide no evidence to back it up. My realtor and I did extensive digging (including calling the place who manages the MUD districts) and they said they couldn\'t find any MUD district associated with the address/subdivision. I checked all the tax records of the houses in the neighborhood that had already been built for long enough to incur property taxes and no one had paid property taxes.\n\nI just checked the appraisal district page, and it\'s showing us in a MUD! I still don\'t see where any of our neighbors are paying this, but the 2018 property tax statement isn\'t out yet.\n\nHere\'s my question: is it legal to start randomly charging a MUD fee when it\'s never been charged before? Wouldn\'t they have to get all the existing homeowners to agree to the creation of a MUD district? We are within Conroe city limits and pay our water/sewer to the city.

If I had this question, I would first go back to the title company that issued my title commitment and title policy and have them research their tax service that issued the tax information for your purchase. They had to determine if your property was being taxed by a MUD district properly. Where you pay your water/sewer/trash bill (in this case to the City of Conroe) may not be a reliable factor in determining your responsibility to pay a MUD tax. The utility sharing agreements and annexation policies for growing cities can be complex. When your MUD was formed, It filed a boundary map with the TNRCC (State of Texas) and it was approved by the state. They were then given authority to set up their board, establish an infrastructure plan, and sell bonds to start construction. It is common for the MUD to only service the areas in their district as the demand is present, so the infrastructure costs can be kept down and increased only as necessary to serve new customers as they are ready. If a city annexes some of the district area before the infrastructure is complete, sometimes the city as part of the annexation plan will install the new lines and bill those customers on those lines, but you may still be responsible to help pay on the bonds that were sold to build the initial infrastructure if your property is in their boundary. In days past, when cities annexed areas they sometimes paid off MUD bonds or took them over as part of the annexation, but that is not happening as much any more as cities are now having tighter budgets. Talk to your title company, representatives for the MUD District, and the city utility administration - someone will have the complete story for you. This should have been determined and fully disclosed to you prior to your closing in my opinion. One of the questions on the Seller Disclosure is who do you pay utility bills to? When you see \"City of Conroe\" for water/sewer and then you see a tax for a MUD district - red flags should have gone up

i\'m looking to buy a house and i have 2 options. Both houses are 350k, however house A is assessed at 300k in 2017 and house B at 400k in 2017. Both have 3.5% property tax. If i buy A, would i pay property taxes for 350k or 300k? In other words, if i like both houses, should the assessed price pursuade me to A or B? Thankyou

If you buy a home and close at a price that is significantly lower than the assessed value, it has been my experience that when you protest the assessment the next year, if you take the closing statement in to HCAD, they will honor it and lower the assessment for that tax year to the actual sale price. However, the very next year their computer valuation model will again take over and set your assessment based on their data (which will likely be back where you were the previous year or higher). You will then have to protest the assessment again based on other criteria such as property description discrepancies or other to try to get the assessment lowered. And a word to the wise, if you buy a home for much higher than the assessed value, the sale will likely be recorded in the MLS system and be picked up by HCAD and the assessment will jump up to that sale price the very next year. Remember, HCAD is trying to assess as high as they can get away with (or justify) each year. It is your responsibility as a property owner to protest each year that you do not agree with their valuation and present your best case. If it is a valid case, they will usually work with you and reset the value to a better amount. They know that your rights must be respected because you will eventually end up in front of a panel of three arbitrators and one is just a regular citizen just like you.

Hello,\nI am owning few rental properties in TX and out of state with my primary residence in WA.\nI decided to study for TX real estate license. Now that I am about to finish the classes I need to establish TX residency. Please advice how someone from another state can establish TX residency without actually moving to TX. Thank you!

As the previous Realtor stated, I am a Texas Real Estate Broker and I am not qualified to give legal advice. You must seek a qualified attorney for a legal opinion for any legal question. However, having been a broker for more than 40 years here in Texas I can share my experience with you. TREC requires you to be a Texas resident to become a licensed agent in Texas for a very good reason. As a licensed agent you will work under a sponsoring (Texas) broker to be active. The sponsoring broker is responsible for supervising your activities on an ongoing basis. It would not be possible for a Texas broker to properly supervise your activities if you are physically out of state and trying to conduct real estate services to Texas residents. Even the logistics of trying to serve Texas residents from out of state is somewhat perplexing. If you are seeking to participate in real estate commissions on properties you personally buy and sell, it may be more practical for you to become licensed in your state of residence, and then when you seek to participate in a transaction in Texas, ask the Texas Broker for the transaction to pay a referral fee to your Broker as a referring agent (you are referring yourself to the other Broker). Remember, all commissions must be shared Broker to Broker, then your Broker can share with you as per your agreement. If you are not actively licensed in Texas, you cannot represent clients in Texas (even yourself) without violating TREC regulations. TREC is charged with protecting the public (in Texas) and it has been my experience over 40+ years that they do a good job and take their responsibility very seriously. I urge you to not try to circumvent their residency requirement if you actually live out of state. Any TREC investigation (and they do investigate most all complaints) will uncover a noncompliant situation and you and whoever your Texas Broker might be that might participate with you will be held accountable for any noncompliance.

How dangerous is it to buy flooded homes?

There are many factors to consider - the current status of the property, the current flood plain status, current status with the flood plain administrator for that area, etc. Harris County and most of the cities in the County are in the process of evaluating their floodplain management policies and how they are going to handle the many flooded properties. So, even if you try to get a status now, it may change as the policies change. Understand that any mortgaged property that is in the 100 yr, flood plain requires a flood ins. policy for loan approval. If the property has been issued a substantial damage letter/designation it may not qualify for flood insurance without major changes - like raising the structure several feet. Plus Harris County is now restricting solid foundations near floodways, so your structure may not just have to be raised, but put on pilings rather than a slab. If the HOA does not allow pier foundations you have a conflict and may not be able to use the property at all until it is resolved. Right now buying flooded homes is full of perils in addition to the physical rehab of the property.

For 130k-150K which area would generate the maximum monthly rent?

The amount of rent versus investment is not a common parameter in evaluating investment properties. The more common term is cash flow generated from total cash investment - which is called \"Cash-on-cash return\". This tool is used to compare properties for the first year only return on cash invested. Cash invested will include down payment, closing costs and other costs to prepare the property for rental. Cash flow (pre-tax) will be the funds the property will generate the first year in excess of the costs to pay operating expenses and mortgages. A typical good investment should return 10-25% first year cash on cash return. An excellent property with good leverage (financing terms) can return in excess of 50% cash on cash the first year. To achieve the higher yields, you will likely have to find multi-family properties that offer attractive owner finance terms and are in distress. Most of the time, these properties are not ready to rent and will need some rehab work to get ready. The purchase can be completed in two steps - first, with a construction/hard money loan, then refinance out with a permanent investor mortgage. In some cases the owner will finance with a low monthly payment for the first 6 months to give you time to rehab and lease up the property. The area is not as important as the property itself, but always seek an area that has low crime, good schools, access to freeways and shopping, etc.