Finding a place to rent: A house or commercial space

[liquidcooled420]

I have always wondered what would be the best place to rent when doing a larger setup(over 6k). I know that big houses draw alot of power and have large capacity breaker boxes, but it is somewhat suspicous to rent a big house with only one person on the lease.

Maybe a home based web hosting company with lots of storage space would be a good cover, reason for the need for so much space and power. Or if you personaly knew a real estate agent that dealt with rentals you would be all set i suppose.

I have also seen people rent commercial spaces in old remodeled warehouses to store boats and cars or as a shipping center for their supplies. These places might need fire inspections or something.

 

[Sam the Caveman]

I wouldn't be too worried about electricity consumption unless the landlord foots the bill, just pay on time. So you don't need a big house really to justify a large bill.

It would also help to rent from a large rental management company, owners who use management companies usually have lots of houses and don't give 2 shits about the house as long as the numbers work in his favor. You can also freely ask about how much privacy you can expect and you can also ask for references to current renters of theirs to make sure they aren't going to pull any stunts.

Find a house with a garage you can park in and close when you visit, nobody will know if you are home or away unless they see you pull in.

don't know about commercial space, but I'd consider it riskier than a house.

 

[Lazyman]

Commercial spaces require pretty big bankrolls, check out the power rates for commercial spaces, it's typically 3-5 times what residential power costs. You ready for a $10K a month power bill?

 

[rickemery]

some excuses i have thought of for being a single individual renting a large home and using lots of power is being either an inventor, or an artist.
as an inventor i keep many electronic parts around, microwave transformers, electric motors, flywheels, variable dc power sources etc. many inventors keep to themselves and are secretive by nature, so it is a perfect false bio for a grower.
as an artist i say i work with steel, and keep various scrap metals and parts around, as well as several welders.
another good excuse for renting a large home as a single person could be you want to use that large basement or garage to begin your lifelong dream of woodworking. the possibilites are endless, if you can lie good enough you can fool anyone into believing pretty much anything. its sad us growers must lie to grow our wonderful herb, but you gotta do whats necassary. just some funky thoughts, peace

 

[Lazyman]

Much more common and high powered home enterprises is a rack of servers. But nobody should be asking.

 

[ddrew]

Lousy little $20 target space heater pulls 1500watts, found that out by plugging one in the other day and Pow, there went the fuse, took a look at it, 1500Ws, damn.
Lots of excuses for power

I think a house is the better bet.
Say your a single dad, and don't you have your kids that often, but you want them to have there own rooms for when they're over.

 

[Raphael]

Commercial spaces require pretty big bankrolls, check out the power rates for commercial spaces, it's typically 3-5 times what residential power costs. You ready for a $10K a month power bill?

What? I was under the impression that you pay a lot less per kilowatt hour under commercial rates.

I just paid $800 for my electric bill this month using 1000w 24 hours a day as well as 1600w 12/12. The rates were around $0.45 per kilowatt hour! The majority of my usage was over the 300% baseline.

Commercial rates have a lot higher baseline than residential rates, thus making it cheaper to use more electricity.

 

[rickemery]

i also thought that commerical rates would be cheaper, but ive never actually had any kind of commercial unit so cant be sure. .45$ per kilowatt hour! omg thats incredibly high, i believe mine is .10$ per kwh plus .05$ per kwh for delivery.

 

[smallfry707]

there is always the care / ferra program. Turns your 1300 dollar a month electric bill to 400ish. and commercial is cheaper then residential atleast here in cali. If you go over your baseline rate it doubles. Agriculture electricity actually is the cheaperst, if you can get access to a farm your good as gold

 

[ItsAllOver]

I think Caveman has the answers. Well put.
When you say over 6k, do you mean 6.5k or 30k?
Only suggestion I have is to aim for an area where power outages are not common, and make sure the house is in PERFECT working order. The last thing you want is to have to do repairs on the electrical system, plumbing, etc when you have a serious op in there. That's one thing I worry about.
Learn how to smile and lie through your teeth to neighbors and everyone. Plan your story, and say it into the mirror a few dozens times so you are used to it and it doesn't seem awkward dropping it on people the first few times. If you live with a girl or anything, practice with them, too.

Take care

 

[mpd]

The first (and golden) rule of commercial growing operation is to never rent the building, buy the building. Once you buy it you can fence it off, put your dogs in the yard and dogs are the sure-fire way of preventing grow rip-offs or surprise visitors.

Right now there is a glut of foreclosed homes on the market and institutions are making all kinds of deals to get the real estate off their books. Just tell them you are looking to get into the foreclosure market and do a long-term hold so that you can maximize your capital gains when the market completely recovers and nobody will suspect unless you are wearing your "Marijuana Growers Unite" T-shirt and have a rap sheet longer than my arm for grow busts.

When you own, your home is your castle. When you rent, the landlord shows up and you start having to do stupid things.

Stay safe and grow the same way my friend.

 

[humble1]

On tha power outage tip:
electrical service is divided into blocks by PG&E. not the physical, the block i live on, kind of blocks but areas of service with their own power substation or transformer set. proximity to hospitals, police, fire, or other emergency services usually put your house or business on a block that is somewhat immune to outages. this means that in the event of rolling blackouts (cali growers know what i'm talking about) your block is the absolute dead last to be hit by an outage. some of these emergency blocks have their own generator system that kicks in.
that one summer, some years back, when blackouts and brownouts were a daily thing here in the bay, my house never got hit. guess why.

 

[humble1]

The first (and golden) rule of commercial growing operation is to never rent the building, buy the building.

the flipside of that argument is that you suddenly become eligible for asset forfeiture/seizure laws. even if you're never charged. even if you're acquitted.

 

[deepforest]

you could easily rent a workshop / industrial space and drop in a couple 8kw rooms on a flip. it might take you some time to build the rooms unless you have a partner or two but you can do it. 8kw going 24/7 in an industrial building is nothing. just make sure you have enough cash for at least to pay the electrical bill until after the first harvest and sale as well as for building supplies as most commercial spaces youll probably need to frame and buildout your own rooms to spec. also its not a bad idea to drive around a big truck or something along that lines, itd be strange to see some skinny guy showing up to his workshop in a geo metro wearing a punkrock tshirt and ripped jeans. make sure your comfortable with at least putting in new circuits and sub panels and have a bit of carpentry knowledge cause its not like you can just call someone in. well you can, but id avoid all outside contact.

 

[FLoJo]

ill be following as well... always seems like the biggest pain is getting the new spot..

keep in mind as well that the number of properties you are currently renting can be pulled up, so dont be renting like 5 places under your name

 

[Sam the Caveman]

ill be following as well... always seems like the biggest pain is getting the new spot..

keep in mind as well that the number of properties you are currently renting can be pulled up, so dont be renting like 5 places under your name

If the officials are looking to see how many houses you rent, your f'ed already.

I don't know of too many people that would be cool with me renting a house in their name to have a grow op in, seriously, who would? If you can find an alternate identity with a credit history and a SSN, have at it, good luck finding that though.

 

[FLoJo]

Sam, I dont mean officials.. if you go through the traditional motions with credit checks n whatnot, it will show that you have credit inquires from other land lords.... if he/she decides to contact them and asking why they accepted/turned you down, they can easily find out that you currently have 1,2,3,4 other places, which may become fishy really fast

 

[Sam the Caveman]

Good point FloJo, I didn't think about that.

If you were going to rent multiple places, you could rent them all at once so it would look as if you are inquiring about renting and then seal the deal on all of them.

 

[milehighmedical]

If you're land lord's checking your credit and whatnot, you're already making a mistake. The ideal land lord should be way too busy to do a credit check. The less time your land lord has the better your relationship will be.

It may be discouraging at first, but just ditch every house you get to till you find one where the land lord clearly does not care about what the normal land lord might care about. This might take weeks and be extremely frustrating. But just DO IT.

My land lord gets the rent on the first of every month. That's all we have to talk about. Every time he asks me if everything's fine at the house (i.e. repairs needed?) and I respond with a cheerful yes. Even though everything in this house is a piece of shit, half of it doesn't even work. I willingly sacrifice the novelty of having a fully functioning household in exchange for a location where the land lord will avoid coming by if he can.

 

[Sam the Caveman]

there are some houses for sale not too far from my house that aren't in the worst neighborhood, but I certainly wouldn't want to live there, and are less than 20k for 3 bedroom houses. There are a few that are 14 to 16k.

That being said, if a property is that cheap to buy, forget renting and risk dealing with a landlord. If the property ever gets seized, so what, it was cheaper than renting it for 2 years.

There are also a lots of foreclosed properties being sold "as is" for less than half of what the surrounding properties are being sold for, but they are about 45k.