Lancaster, NY revaluation. It stinks!
Well, if you live in Lancaster, NY, you probably received a lovely letter yesterday regarding your property taxes and your property assessment. There were increases that appear across the board. The equalization rate is no longer as we have moved to 100% valuation. The increases are staggering in many cases.
The town of Lancaster continues to spend, and spend, and spend on projects that don’t benefit the town as a whole.
- There is a pricey new addition to town hall (approximately $985,000).
- There is a new police and courts facility in the works ($8,000,000 Plus).
- There is the new use of a former library for an emergency management office (that’s right, Lancaster has one).
- There is the proposed recreational facility that will certainly add long term costs.
- etc. etc.
Let’s not forget that use of these properties suddenly pulls them off the tax rolls. And, in the case where a sale is possible, eliminates the funds from a sale (Depew Library is a prime example).
Many will be fighting the new assessment figures. In a couple of cases, I will be one of them. If you aren’t familiar with the tools available to you for searching property information here are a couple:
I know that there is quite a bit of state and/or federal funding drying up for Towns and Villages. How about cutting costs rather than continuing to spend. If a surplus builds, cut taxes!
Politics suck.
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Administrator Real Estate, Tools and Reviews, Uncategorized assessment, assessments, lancaster, new york, ny, revaluation, review, taxes, town, village
A couple of people have asked if I had a blank rental application that they could use for residential / apartments. I do have a very simple form that can be used to gather information. There are a number of rental applications that will include a number of items that aren’t of importance at this stage.
This simple rental application form is a single page and is not branded. Use as you wish. I am sure many of you will find this usefull.
On the topic of rental screening… Please check references. I have found that references are as good a gauge of a tenant as a credit score.
Rental Applications
Blank Rental Application (.DOC format for Microsoft Word)
Blank rental application (.PDF format – Adobe Acrobat)
The .DOC version should be editable. Feel free to contact us by posting a comment if you need this in a different format.
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Administrator Tools and Reviews apartment, application, blank, doc, pdf, rental, residential, tenant, word
I bought my wife a Dyson Root vacuum last year and the battery on this handheld doesn’t last at all. Is everyone else having this problem? I called the Dyson company and told them that the battery runs down after about 3-6 minutes and stops operating and that told me that was “normal”. I was blown away. I would expect a lot more from Dyson.
I am not going to go into a full review here, but I will say that we love the vacuum otherwise. Powerful, compact, and incredibly easy to empty/clean. This is everything you would want in a handheld vacuum… except for the short life of the battery. We have a good amount of hardwood and it barely makes it around the perimeter and under the kitchen cabinets.
Is the battery life really that poor?
Dyson Root Vacuum = short battery life
Is there anything that can be done? I haven’t looked into a replacement battery for the root yet, but I will have to. We are 1 year in and the performance has gotten worse. It hardly holds a charge for 30 seconds.
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Administrator Tools and Reviews battery, dyson, life, replacement, root, vacuum
As most readers of this blog know, the Kidde 1275 smoke detector is not a good unit. They were inexpensive and used by a ton of builders in new builds. Many folks have experienced middle of the night alarms that make it difficult to trust the units in the future. Since the alarms are hard wired, many folks would love a unit that can be swapped with the current ones with minimal effort.
Kidde has the same interface for a newer model and can swap out with the 1275’s. The unit is the i12040. If you don’t trust your old 1275’s, but don’t want to pay an electrician to rewire at every unit, the i12040’s might be worth a try. If Kidde has solved the defective unit issue with this model, then we can sleep tight.
In fact the cost for 10 replacement units would be less than the cost for an electrician to come out and rewire the connectors to a different model. This model also has a ‘hush’ feature that could come in handy.
If your 1275’s were installed by the builder, the reason for the false alarms could be due to dust during construction. Most builders will keep them covered with a cellophane cover during the construction phase, but that isn’t always the case. Swapping the 1275 out with a new i12040 could be a cheap fix for a big annoyance and middle of the night wake ups.
Kidde i12040 smoke alarm - replacement for the Kidde 1275
Model i12040 Replaces all existing 1275 smoke alarm models
Current replacement units are shipped as i12040 which are a direct change-out replacement for the Kidde 1275. They fit the Quick-Connect power harness for a speedy installation.
Read more about the experience many have had with the defective Kidde 1275
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Administrator Coupons and Sales, Tools and Reviews 1275, alarm, detector, i12040, kidde, smoke
If you have been a landlord for any period of time, I am certain that you have taken some vacancy loss, or had late payers that, in turn, led to a tenant skipping out on rent owed. After you have that experience, you realize the need to screen prior to allowing a tenant to sign a lease for your rental property.
I have used a service for the past few years called e-renter. They allow you to run a credit check and/or a criminal background check. Obviously nothing is foolproof, but by doing some basic tenant screening, you can eliminate some of the worst potential rent loss issues.
I often tell the story of the owner of a duplex next to mine having an issue with a tenant and I asked her what screening service she used. She paused and answered “… ooohhh, maybe that is the problem”. She wasn’t screening at all and only collected 4 months of rent in her first 10 months of ownership. The first tenant was recently bankrupt and the second was headed there. Had she screened in advance, she would have gotten a better picture of her prospective tenant.
In addition to tenant screening, I encourage any landlord to be sure they check references. I have rented to people with less than perfect credit because their references were so solid and their story regarding the credit issues checked out. I have also had references throw their ‘friends’ under the bus and essentially say “you would be crazy to rent to them”.
Do your homework… screen your tenants… be a real person and learn the story before you accept the first person who says “I’ll take it”.
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Administrator Real Estate, Tools and Reviews screening, tenant
The DIY Network has upgraded their web site. If you haven’t been, you should check it out at DIY Network.
The DIY site has a ton of helpful project information and can provide a lot of great ideas for those of us searching for that next great project to tackle.
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Administrator Tools and Reviews diy, network
