First-Time Landlord: Your Guide to Renting out a Single-Family Home (USA Today/Nolo Series) Review

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(More customer reviews)I've reviewed three Nolo books now and all three have done a wonderful job of translating complicated legal mumbo-jumbo into readable material regular folks can understand. They may not replace the advice of a lawyer in my opinion, but perhaps I'm just a wimp. I was a little apprehensive of a book publisher of this caliber teaming up with USA Today as I consider their newspaper the sort of thing people read when they don't want to learn anything. Still, in a strange way, the combination works rather well. Nolo provides the information and the pages are sprinkled with interesting factoids or Snapshot Pictures to keep the material from getting too dry and putting you to sleep. It makes the entire book reader-friendly while still providing a valuable source of info.
Here are the different chapters:
1. Is Owning Rental Property for You?
2. Landlording with Family or Friends
3. Preparing and Marketing Your Rental Property
4. Screening and Choosing Good Tenants
5. Preparing a Lease and Getting the Tenant Moved In
6. Manage Your Rental Income to Maximize Tax Deductions
7. Keeping Things Shipshape: Repairs and Maintenance
8. Landlord Liability for Injuries, Crimes, and More
9. Dealing with Difficult Tenants
10. Hiring a Property Manager
11. Exiting the Rental Property Business
Each chapter has subchapters with specific topics that are easily referenced via the table of contents if you are searching for something specific.
Like other Nolo books, First-Time Landlord provides a step-by-step guide to the process of purchasing an investment property from start to finish. UNLIKE other Nolo books, First-Time Landlord does not provide a reference guide containing the various laws in the 50 different states that will impact you. Instead, you will frequently get phrases like, "check state law", that tend to get annoying. Even worse, they often don't provide suggestions as to which state department or authority we should talk to. Those blue pages in the phone book get larger every year and it's difficult to play the runaround game with state workers when we don't know where to begin. It's a significant omission and I hope it's updated in future editions, but it's my only gripe. Otherwise, any potential landlord will want to read this book first and I'm still giving them five stars for the info and layout. Nice job, Nolo.

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Whether or not you call yourself a "landlord", when you rent out a house you'll want to do it right!The "Landlording 101" course for new rental property owners who are first-time landlords by way of an inheritance, divorce, investment, purchase for a family member, or a move to a new house.90% of small properties are owned by individual landlords, and millions in this group are balancing their landlord responsibilities with their daytime careers. First - Time Landlord provides concise information for those with little business savvy and less time and patience to become big-time real estate investors, but who wish to make money on their new property while renting it out lawfully and right! It covers:
How to determine whether or not the property will turn a profit
Landlord business basics
Finding good tenants
Preparing and signing a leaseHandling Repairs
Complying with applicable rental laws
Dealing with problem tenants
Preparing for sale of propertyContaining tips, true stories, and shared first-time experiences, First - Time Landlord is an indispensable book for the new landlords of today's dominant rental housing market.

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Companion To Narnia Review

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(More customer reviews)I have read and re-read all seven of C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia many times in my adult life. And plan to do so again and again. The remarkable thing is that the stories still seem fresh and alive. They never seem to get boring and there are always new insights waiting to be discovered. Even for the adult reader. I would highly recommend the stories to all young readers, even though I myself did not read them as a child. I think I was so bent on trying to read the entire works of Enid Blyton at the time, that I failed to notice anything Narnian about my local library.
"New insights" are what the Companion To Narnia is all about. Paul F. Ford has done a wonderful job of assembling all of the myriad of characters, places, themes; all the rich history and lore of Narnia and beyond, into this one encyclopedic book. I really cannot see how it could be improved upon. It is massive in scope. I have read it and "used" it for years now.
The book is arranged alphebetically and all topics are meticulously cross-referenced (an asterisk follows any word or phrase which is an entry elsewhere). Even though this is not the type of book that is commonly read from cover to cover, picking it up and starting from any topic will surely tempt you to the reading of the asterisk-linked articles. In Narnian terms, I think of this as the hidden "Turkish-Delight" feature of the book. Let it take you where your curiosity and interest leads.
At the end of the articles, Ford has placed in parentheses an abbreviated reference to the specific book and page number that coincides with the topic being discussed. This sends us back to the original source of the material if necessary, and allows Ford's book to be not only a companion, but a sort-of concordance as well. It is a very useful feature.
The copious footnotes will definitely appeal to those who are interested in learning more about the creator of Narnia. These notes clearly show that Paul Ford is an expert in his knowledge of the man C.S. Lewis. (A good example is the numerous footnotes to the article entitled "Digory Kurke").
Another great feature of the book is that not only are characters and place-names discussed, but also the IDEAS and THEMES of the Chronicles are examined. For instance there are comprehensive articles on such things as: Dreams, Knowledge, Fear, Privacy, Sounds, Music, Obedience, Birds, Ecology, etc. Of particular worthy mention is the great five page section on Biblical Allusions.
The final thing I will mention is that there are wonderful illustrations throughout the book, and these serve to take the imagination even further into the world that is Narnia.
The book is appropriately titled. My desk-dictionary has, as one of its definitions for the word companion... "one of a pair of matching things". In my opinion, any bookshelf that has its Narnia, ought to have its Companion.

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San Francisco Architecture: The Illustrated Guide to Over 600 of the Best Buildings, Parks, and Public Artworks in the Bay Area Review

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(More customer reviews)San Francisco is a city with a long and unique history. With this history comes a wide variety of interesting and sometimes stunningly beautiful buildings. Wandering the streets of San Francisco, and noticing these buildings, one frequently wants to learn more about them. And that is why I bought this book.
However, I was disappointed by the fact that most of the houses featured in this volume only have the year it was built, who built it, and a very brief description. Often there is only one sentence saying this house was built in Queen Anne style and that it has a tower (self-evident from the picture, or once you actually see the building). The book says very little about the history of each house, why it was built like it was, notable persons that lived there, etc. It also does very little to put the houses in the context of the surrounding neighborhood.
The book features "tours" that you can take to view the described houses, but it doesn't quite pull it off, and the end result is a strange mix of tourist guide and architectural reference that performs mediocre at both.
San Francisco desperately needs a good book to picture, describe and catalog its unique architecture, but alas, this book is not it. It would have been better if the author concentrated the book on San Francisco houses only, instead of the entire Bay Area, and offered fewer houses with a better description of each. Still, it is the best I have been able to find, and it is better than nothing, hence the three stars.

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San Francisco Architecture: An Illustrated Guide to the Outstanding Buildings, Public Art Works, and Parks in the Bay Area of California Review

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(More customer reviews)The new edition of San Francisco Architecture is everything a portable guide to the built environment should be: organized, accessible, and with enough detail to expand one's sense of time, place, and people. Fortunately, from this reader's point of view, it was written for a lay, rather than specialist, audience; the result is neither exhaustive nor exhausting, merely highly informative. As with any reference book, it must address specific information needs of a specific audience, and, in my estimation, this guide does so very well for a reader with general interest in buildings around the Bay Area.
San Francisco Architecture is unusually well designed and produced: the photography, layout, information structure, typography and printing (espcially the halftone reproduction) are all exemplary and reinforcing of each other. Visually, it is as satisfying as it is workmanlike -- free of excess or caprice and dedicated to serving information effectively.

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Visitors and residents alike continue to be pleasantly astonished by the rich and varied architectural heritage of the San Francisco Bay Area. This completely revised and updated guide offers a comprehensive catalog of noteworthy and representative sites, including residential and commercial buildings, parks, and public art works, each illustrated by an accompanying photograph. All are located within the major San Francisco neighborhoods as well as outlying areas. Useful maps, descriptive tidbits, and sightseeing hints embellish this densely packed volume. Whether used as the basis for a walking tour or as a reference for students and historians, SAN FRANCISCO ARCHITECTURE is the definitive guide to the natural and urban development of one of the most recognized and visited areas in the world. A completely revised and updated guide to San Francisco Bay Area architecture with new entries, photographs, and maps. Illustrated with more than 600 photographs.Of the many guidebooks on the San Francisco Bay Area, this is the only one to offer a comprehensive catalog of architectural sites.

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