Help!! Condo question

General Real Estate Investing
1

Hi, I thank you in advance for your response(s).

I own a 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom apartment/condo in a very hot part of the city of Vancouver, Canada. The market in Vancouver is particularly hot right now, and has been for some time. I don’t see that situation changing anytime soon. We purchased the property less than two years ago at well below market value, fixed it up and had planned to sell it for a nice profit. The profit we make will allow us a lot of freedom in terms of our choices, paying off some debt and re-investing in other property.

Now, I am well aware that holding onto the apartment and watching the market situation in Vancouver rise might be the best way to go. However, we are currently travelling and don’t have any immediate plans to return to Vancouver, except to sell the condo sometime next year. We are not allowed to rent the apartment.

The way I see it, we would be best to hang onto the apartment, but as long as we have it, it’s not working for us. Taking the money out will allow us to do some things.

I am wanting to gauge the ideas of others here in case I am missing something. Any ideas or inspirations??

2

You may be able to still rent the appartment depending on what the rules are in your association. Many will allow it to be rented to a family member, or you could deed 1% to the renter. then they would be a partial owner, which should be allowable. But you must absolutly trust the renter if you are going to do this.

3

Thanks for the response, RC. The no rentals rule comes from the Strata; there are a few rentals suites in our building, but there is a cap of only 6 suites or so. We applied for and were granted permission to rent the suite for the 12 months or so that we are away from Vancouver, but that must end in June, 2007.

We have no family in Vancouver, so that’s not an option. We could try the “housesitting” idea, but I’m not sure how successful that would be.

I hadn’t thought of deeding 1% to a renter. But you’re right, you’d have to absolutely comfortable with the person with whom you had an arrangement like that. Yikes!

4

RentalCashFlow,

I hadn’t heard of this before. Great idea…thanks ;D.