Interview with the “Pitbull” himself– Leonard Rosen

If you have been around hard money lending for any time at all, you probably know Leonard Rosen.  And if you have thought about getting into hard money lending for yourself, you have most likely considered going to Leonard’s private …

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Depreciation….Whaaaat??

At its most basic, Basis is the cost of the item. With a simple item such as a vehicle the definition would stop there and this would be a really short post. However, Basis also includes the cost of acquisition and in real estate those line items can be significant expenses. Here’s a short-list of the most common:

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All Real Estate Taxes are Deductible…

Well like all things tax code; not always. In fact, many tax professionals get this one wrong too. Further, the same mistake is pervasive on both personal residences and investment properties.

A thorough review of your real property tax bill will reveal the total is the combination of many different items and it is in those details that the answers are buried. Let’s use an example tax record to take a closer look. Our example property was randomly pulled from HUD foreclosure list.

Review of the tax section reveals that the total tax bill is $6,114. The $6,114 is the total of $3,068 State/County Tax, $2,515 City Tax, and $531 Special Tax. There is also a space for Refuse if the local jurisdiction includes that as part of the total.

The requirements to be able to deduct a real estate tax are: Continue reading

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Annandale Virginia Hard Money Loan

HMB funded this Virginia hard money loan in February 2010.  The Borrower purchased this property at a discount at an auction.  They renovated the kitchen and bathrooms, and replaced the carpet and painted the entire townhouse.  The Buyer listed the …

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Follow The Big Dogs

By:  Jeff Shiller, Esq. There seems to be a natural progression for a real estate investor: –          First, he gets some education, overcomes his fear, and nervously buys his first residential investment property; –          After gaining some confidence and doing …

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Depreciation…Blessing or Curse?

This week we are going to begin embarking on a journey that starts with the concept of depreciation and leads us to many forks in today’s tax code.  We’ll talk about exactly what depreciation is further in the post; but, …

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Special-K…1099 that is

Congress is rolling out the reporting red carpet in a big way in 2011 and 2012.  While some of these new reporting requirements do not affect real estate investors directly; for the most part, news of the introduction of each …

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