Rental Property
Both renters are still renting, and one says he wants to stay over the summer. They both say they have friends who want to stay during the summer. Originally, I wanted to rent out the entire top part of the house, but if this is what’s happening naturally, I’ll let it happen.
Near the beginning of March, I bought a Ryobi reciprocating saw and used it to take out a lot of brush, roots, and vines. Unfortunately, near the end of the month, it broke. The neck snapped. It was a couple days over the return period, but Home Depot was nice enough to take it back. The guy at the cash register was a little flustered when I showed up but not because of me. Before me, there was a foreign guy who was trying to steal some money, literally. The manager was telling him to not reach his hand in the cash register for any reason. So, maybe the cashier accepted my return because he was flustered. I just wanted to see what was possible. If they pushed back, I would’ve kept the broken sawzall and batteries. Maybe I was too rough on it. Next time, I’m going to try out Milwaukee.
And, of course, I had another huge pile of brush to take out to the street. This time, I left part of it, but it was still a huge pile with a lot of heavy branches. I was worried they wouldn’t take it, but thankfully they did.
Lending
I’m taking a break from lending. To be honest, it’s pretty stressful. So, now, my two main side hustles are web development and renting.
If I were to start from scratch with lending, there are a couple things I’d do differently.
- I’d set up a form on a website (like an extension request form) or something and have clients reach out through that instead of texting.
- I’d limit all loans to a max of $800 (or maybe even $600) and avoid the big loans (learning from painful experience). Anything above $800 is too much for the average person to handle, even people who make good money. Come to think of it, I think all of the loans for $600 and under were paid back.
Those two things alone would probably improve the lending experience drastically.
Knife Sharpening
No progress, despite having a table in the shed to sharpen knives. The table’s a little wobbly though. Maybe if I had a more sturdy table, I’d be more motivated to sharpen knives.