Once again the monster of landlord licensing raises it ugly head in KC. As a Realtor who works entirely in the investment property sector of our economy I have an in-depth knowledge of this beast. While I do not own or invest in investment property I mange hundreds of rental units, throughout the KC metro area, I also assist investors with purchasing and selling investment property.
Kansas City has been toying with this notion for over twenty years. The last attempt by Kay Barnes was put to a vote and soundly defeated. A provision called the Hancock Amendment is one of our greatest allies in this battle. In short any tax increase must be approved by a vote of the people. Landlord licensing is a tax increase!
Secondly we have the fourth amendment to the Constitution of the US on our side. Basically, any tenant could refuse to allow any agent of the government access to their home without a proper warrant. Mark Funkhouser ran for Mayor of KC with the landlord licensing provision as one of his main objectives. Now his minions have picked up the torch and are running with it again.
Kansas City has a codes department, they have codes inspectors and like most municipalities operate by a written set of building codes. The problem with the landlord licensing plan is it targets property based on whether the property is owner occupied or not. Codes work well, codes need to be uniform in nature and uniform in their application. enforcing codes should be done on all properties in Kansas City not just the ones they believe they can get a tax increase out of.
The local media and their Kool-Aid drinking readers like to use words like "absentee landlords" and "slumlords". they like to toss out phrases like "they don't care about their property", the truth is they care a great deal. Every investor I know has thousand of dollars invested in their real estate. Most have a mortgage, insurance, taxes, maintenance and management costs. The notion that one invests tens of thousands of dollars in a property and then disregards it is almost as absurd as this proposal.
Several years ago the Kansas City Fire Marshall was sent out to do fire code inspections. They decided they had a mandate to do so and demanded a fee for the inspection. The landlord groups of Kansas City sued and won, defeating this tax too.
Kansas City Crime: The real problem in Kansas City is our massive crime dilemma. Property crimes are staggering, vacant homes are stripped daily, plumbing, wiring HVAC even sinks and lights are stolen, sold for scrap and houses are destroyed. Kansas City had the dubious distinction of making the list of the 16th most dangerous city in the nation last year. We are well on track to raising that number this year.
The Reason: Kansas City and Jackson County do not prosecute or incarcerate low level crimes. They lack the jail space needed to house the criminals and they recycle repeat offenders back into the community until they commit a crime so heinous that the State finally has to come in and pursue the prosecution. In the interim they are burglarizing, robbing, stealing, and devaluing our neighborhoods and our properties. If we want to improve the quality of the housing we must first address the criminal element that is devaluing the property.
Landlord Licensing is just another tax!
D. Ben Edsall, Accredited Residential Manager, Turn-Key Properties LLC, Kansas City Investment Property
Investment and Commercial Real estate, property management, sales, leasing and management of commercial, residential and multi-family. 25 years experience, Accredited Residential Management.
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Ben
Sounds like you are going to be fighting this for a while. Why is it that everyone can see how bad these ideas are except for the politicians with dollar signs in their eyes?
Welcome to active rain. Keep up this fight. I've fired off a few letters myself.
Ben,
I understand the reasoning behind the landlord licensing - get rid of all the vacant properties. But everything I have ready states that properties that need to be registered are currently occupied by someone other than the owner of the property or being offered for rental.
But the vacant properties - houses like the ones I own that are for sale for an area landlord to purchase, rehab and rent or sell - not offered for rent currently. - houses like the ones I used to offer for rent, but am currently working with another investor to purchase to rehab and then rent or sell - not currently being offered as rental. - houses like those foreclosed upon and held for REO sale - not currently offered for rental. - houses where the owener died and did not leave an heir, not being rented. - houses where the owners abandon the property, not currently being rented. Do these need to be registered? By ready the regulations I don't think they need to be registered.
So who will be registering - all the property owners that already have the correct ownership and address recorded in the tax records that they city will be able to notify to register and let us know who owns the property. All those other people that no one can find- probably will not be registering anyway.
Also wondering - the form wants to know who is responsible for the trash and mowing and other yard upkeep. It if is the tenant, they want contact info on the tenant - so are they going to give the code violations to the tenants for not keeping up the yard and if they have to pay a $200 fine, then will they be able to pay rent? Probably not and then they get evicted and we have a vacant house again.
Do you know any more on these questions?
Kim with MAREI (www.MAREInet.com / www.TuckerOneProperties.com)