Who Owns Rental Property?
 

Do you own duplexes? Quads? Storage Units?

What has been your experience to date? Good income? Not worth the hassle?

:helpme

I have a few homes and duplexes. It really depends on your tenants.

In these economic times, finding perfect credit is far and few between. Finding OK credit is a little more common. I suppose it depends on your situation.

Take it with a grain of salt. It's literally made me millions.

My old business partner owns 1 Quad, plus something like 35-40 single family homes, and a half dozen car washes. He prefers the single family homes over apartment buildings. He said it is a lot less grief, typically families, no bitching over noise, parking spots and what not. Which is why he has not bought more. He said 90% of the calls he gets would be from the one complex.

That said, once he got into the car wash game. He said that it was 100 times better than real estate. My guess is the R.O.I. in the short term versus the long term benefits of rentals. Which seems to be more about building equity over time.

Your friend is a smart man. I happen to live in an area that can get away with short term rentals on dupes to seniors. Think South FL. I happen to run into more problems with the long term tennants.

No problem, it's the nature of the beast. I knew it getting into it, and I still deal with it every now and then.

If you consider buying property to rent, my best advice would be to let the initial tenants do their thing. If they happen to keep the joint nice? Bonus. Rent again... rinse and repeat until somebody finally sneaks a pet in, pisses on the carpet - or just plain old have messy kids.

At that point? hire a tile or hardwood floor guy to come in and do the whole thing. Expense up front, save a ton of money in the long run.

This is coming from a guy that for about 5 years thought he needed to replace carpet for new tenants so it felt "homey".

:thumbsup

I own a few places in the Philippines i rent to country visitors who visit on business or vacation. It pays for itself and grows business skills like you wouldn't believe. Highly recommend buying property in another country rather than your own..

Unless you are a billionaire already. Then you should buy a football team or something :pimp

Good insight.

There is a TON of duplexes, Quads, and even a whole complex for sale around here in this market. There are some are in a smaller town to the south that had peeked my interest. Which is maybe 10-15 minutes away from the city where the malls and shit are. But rents are still in the $650-750.00 range depending. There are TON of them available for pennies in the north side of town to the north. But those are typically bad, poor, and mainly black areas. I have been warned about even considering those.

Getting back on the subject of flooring. I had noticed on some of those HGTV and other fixer up shows that they put down the lamenant (i.e. hard wood looking) or tile for all their units. Said it is simply a better enterprise for long term use, and rental property.

Basically easier to keep clean, and you do not have the $5000.00 (or whatever) expense to keep replacing carpet.

I heard that can be more risky than renting to just year round tenant. Although, I suppose if you have a solid location and history of rentals than it may eliminate that risk to some degree.

That would be cool. Be like Jon Bon Jovi who owns an arean football team.
:pimp

Do you guys have any concerns about them getting rid of the mortgage deduction? :(

own some single family homes & apartments. None of them produce positive cash flow however they break even & in under 10 years will all be paid for.
The apartments are in UK and have gone up in value over 200% in last 10 years. THe single family homes are in Texas and have not gone up at all in last 10 years. That's the trouble with living in a state with lots of land the house prices stay stable. Good & bad I guess.

I use a management company that gets 10% so don't have any aggravation.

Yeah, laminent flooring rocks for rentals and get a good management company, mine only charges 8%

If anything that would just increase demand for rentals. As business property you can not only deduct the interest and all maintenance but depreciate the house as well.

Just one house that has had the same tenant the entire time. When it is time for her to move, I will likely sell it.

i wish
got my partner's foreclosure but nobody wants to loan you $ to buy it unless it's your primary home, especially in South Florida. And those that do have minimums of $100k-$150k and that's with LTV ratios

I have 8 condo's in Las Vegas , all 1 Bed / 1 Bath . So far it seems like it's a decent investment , positive cash flow , easy to maintain and lease and it doesnt take much to refurbish a unit if needs to be fixed. The ROI relation to the price paid is far better then a small home or anything bigger, plus the purchase prices of these units were low enough that even if they go down in price over time ( highly unlikely because there already close to the bottom ) that I have already recouped a fair amount by renting.

I own some single family dwellings... The income is nothing special after management fees and property taxes, but I'm still making 8% of the purchase price (per year). These were all bought as foreclosures. The rental income is really just a bonus, I'm hoping that eventually the market will strengthen and I'll be able to sell them at a profit.

Congrats 2 You Fine Sire.
:thumbsup

Very nice. I've heard it's typically 5-10% for a decent management company.

What are the condos costing? How did you find them?
Who are the typical renters?

I own some units. China is looking like its about to correct if youre looking for a bargain. The UK market is usually very good especially in London which is doing well but its also headed for a downturn if interest rates go up which they eventually will. Other than that, London is usually in very high demand and youll never have quiet periods on the rental. There are a lot of risks in the UK market particularly on the sterling currency.

Property is a good way to make money if you buy in the right location and there are opportunities globally but just make sure youre buying into the market at the right time.

My rule of thumb is to look at how other people are buying into the same market place. If mortgages are prevalent, interest rates ultra low and the property wont yield more than say 3% (ie gross rental yield in one year as a percentage of the purchase price) then I be careful. A seller can set any price they like so the yield is one thing you should use to help determine the value. I generally look for at least 5%.

Right now, whilst I dont particularly want to buy in Ireland, I do think its attractive on a valuation basis in both Dublin and Belfast. Some 1 million euro properties (pre-2008 crisis) there are selling for as little as 250k euros.

Id be interested to hear from others on locations which offer excellent value and good long term growth opportunity.....

I own several mixed use properties, they can be a real pain in the ass, but in the long term , there is nothing like real estate investment:thumbsup

Yeah that is why car washes sell at 7X EBITDA - stupid to get in that game now. RE agents are in shock now over how many loans go bad - banks really mean it when thay say 20%. There will be more and more renting. I've never seen a m anagement co that did repairs etc go for less than 10%

He was really lucky. At the time he bought them, some police officer owned like 3 of them and was over his head and could not keep up with them. So he got them for a song. Once he found out how much they make, he bought 2 more off another guy, and then a sixth that was in a bad neighborhood with bums sleeping in it. The place was essentially a burned out structure. He through out the bums, and completely rebuilt it. He swears by the car washed now and is trying to buy them up all around the surrounding cities.


Yep. Actually it's been like that a few years now.

Good info.
:thumbsup

Do you use a management company?

NO, I had used them in the past, right now I mismanage them all by my self :winkwink:

i have been checking into car wash places for a bit now...have a few spots id like to get

now i just need more money..lol

They typically cost around $40000-$50000 . Some of the previous purchase prices before the housing market tanked were in the $250000+ range. I found them online threw MLS listings. They were all foreclosures except for 1. Typical renters have been a mix of some strippers, bartenders , waitress's . Usually I rent to people I hang out with or night club industry people.

I recently invested in a rental community in Fla, 350 units. So far it's doing extremely well, considering the economic duress the state has gone through, it's a no brainer that there will be a ton of rental business in the years to come (I hope =)

you bought a 350 unit building ?:winkwink:

Stick to commercial, way less hassle

:1orglaugh :1orglaugh

Why did you decide to do it yourself? A lot of free time on your hands?
:helpme

naw, like to be hands on and when they are running properly, it dosent take up that much time:thumbsup

Whats cool is they have a repair guy thats fast and cheap, re-plumbed the garbage disposal, parts and all for $75
He does an annual walk thru and gets on them about the yard, which I could give a shit about, I just don't want what happened with the tenants before, they did $10k of damage plus the floors. I still want to know why anyone would drill holes in a new counter top and what happened to the toilet in the back bathroom, it was missing?
Current tenants are awesome in comparison

Around here there is a TON of open commercial space. I do not think it would be a good investment in this economy. Some of these places have not had a tenant in years.

Real estate is VERY area specific. What works for someone even 50 miles away may not work for you. Be very careful that you know YOUR area.

That guy if he likes car washes turn him onto storage units. He'll love those.

When you buy rental property you have to be willing to put some time in, do your homework, and get into them at the right price. If you're not cash flowing, you didn't do this. It does sound like they would be if you weren't using a mgmt co, though.

When you're only breaking even, what about the vacancy rate? Is that including in "breaking even"? What if a couple of units go vacant for several weeks or even a few months?? What do you do when one needs new plumbing, throughout? Etc ..

I understand that you're more interested in long term appreciation and building long term wealth and probably enjoying some tax benefits... but everything should always cash flow.

Any trouble finding tenants? Do you have to search hard for them?
Vegas has cheap shit for sure, but im worried about the market for tenants.

include 10% for repairs in my calculations.
Don't need any income from them so am not currently concerned. Will sell when time is right and put money into other investments.

I heard Nicholas Cage bought his property in vegas for $8m and the bank sold it for $4m out there..... theres got to be a rental market in Las Vegas!! Surely!

I need a roommate ...

With 4 partners =)

Good for you, Congrats:thumbsup I hate partners:winkwink:

So far it hasn't been that bad , Most of the time im renting to tenants friends from word of mouth . I went threw all my places 100% and put in new appliances , tile flooring ,new paint , new fixtures , etc. That helps alot when people are looking , the extra few thousand it took to do that makes the difference.

That definitely seems to be the case more times than not.

Vegas has a huge rental market... There are hundreds of thousands of people in the tourism/service industry, and for a lot of them owning isn't possible right now.

You have to choose them wisely, and have good contracts ! =)

so what did you get a hi rise or a townhouse complex ? or ??

I lost my ass in Real Estate so got smart and got into porn!!! LOLOLOLOL

I've read a few places that Section 8 rentals can be a nice money maker if you have the connections to get those renters. You get paid by the state, and not 'all' are bad renters.

Real estate is a hassle. Too much government regulation, from federal control over the mortgage end, to local zoning vagaries.

The internet is much much better.

too many words