About Me

Hello, I'm John M. Turchetta, the creator of this website and author of "The Landlord's Library" series of books on residential landlording. So that you can get better acquainted with me, I'll be placing my picture here shortly.

I was born and raised in Rhode Island (lil Rhody) and attended public schools. After finishing high school in 1978, I entered the University of Rhode Island in pursuit of an engineering degree. At that time, students were making the transition from "slide rules" to hand held calculators. Computers were cumbersome and we all had to write our own programs in Fortran and Basic to make them work. Many all-nighters had to be spent at the Computer Science Center on the edge of campus in order to complete our projects.

After what seemed like an eternity of studying, I graduated in 1982 with a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and applied mechanics. But, as luck would have it, 1982 proved to be the worst job market for college graduates since the great depression. My graduating class entered a severe economic recession where the prime interest rate for corporate loans hovered around seventeen percent, and mortgage rates were nearly as high!. As a result, job offers were really scarce for graduates that year. I was fortunate, though, and landed a job as a mechanical engineer at a large naval shipyard in Virginia.

After several years of working at the shipyard in Virginia, the economy finally recovered and I entered the commercial world as a construction engineer. Having been around construction all my life, it was only natural for me to gravitate back into it. I worked for a few commercial contracting firms and also purchased and operated some residential apartment houses during this time. I still own and operate these properties today. In 1992, I received my professional engineering license.

Some personal milestones occurred for me recently. In 2005 and 2006, I was awarded US patents on a pretty cool alternative energy system for producing clean electric power from the natural gas pipeline infrastructure. These patents are US 6907727 and US 7043905. The invention provides substantial "grid level" electric power that is very efficient and environmentally friendly. It seems like a "no-brainer", but trying to drum up commercial support has been difficult to say the least.

Anyway, my real passions lie with owning and operating my rental properties and writing. Landlording is a real business that I've learned quite a bit from after nearly 25 years. My properties have allowed me to do pretty much everything that I do today.

I'm a "do-it-yourself" kind of person who enjoys the sense of accomplishing something on my own. My goal is to use my knowledge, experience and writing ability to help people from all walks of life improve their standard of living by owning and operating residential rental property. That is the reason for this website and my landlording books.

As of this writing (October 2007), I'll be 48 years young very soon - boy how time flies! I make my home in Rhode Island and reside with my family and two cats (I'm quite an animal lover). I'm a sports enthusiast who participated in numerous sports in high school. My hobbies include exercising, reading, and watching all types of sports.

I hope you know enough about me now to get a clear picture of my background, experience, and personality. Hopefully, we're not strangers anymore.

I wish you great luck in the future and thanks for visiting my website. Come back again so that you can become a Great Landlord.

Thank you,

John M. Turchetta

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