3rd property in Philly

[Troy Whitney]

So I just joined BP a few weeks ago and am excited to grow and learn from the collective legion of talent and experience on here.   I'm also excited to say I just bought my third property in Philly.  Now I know I may catch some skepticism here as I live in Seattle WA and so am having them professionally managed.   These aren't high class rentals, but cheap little houses that I think should cash flow nicely.  I've found a great broker agent/broker there, a few good contractors, and a what appears to be a really good management company.   I've done a fair amount of research on Philadelphia zip codes and have developed a pretty good sense of where to buy and where not to buy.   Two of these properties are in rapidly changing zip codes - one is in 19145 - South  Philly, one is not too far North of downtown 19121 and  one is a little further up  - 19132 and is in a decent, busy neighborhood and should have the best cash flow (32% cap rate).    The South Philly property I had prospective tenants lined up as soon as I posted an and just recently got a tenant that we carefully screened.  I'm hopeful the other two should be as easy to fill, though I'm still finishing up repairs on #2 and will start next week on #3.  My property manager (a pleasure to work with) tells me that as long as it's in a decent neighborhood, there's substantial demand for rentals in Philly.  Anyways - just wanted to introduce myself and see what other Philly investors come out of the woodwork. Thanks.

[Troy Whitney]

Originally posted by @John Geldert:

@Troy Whitney welcome to BP! Have you ever visited these parts of Philly that your investing in to get a feel for the area? Or did you do your due diligence via the Internet?

Reason I ask, cause I also invest out of state. Although it's not cross country ;)

 Hi John - I really just used Zillow, Google Maps, Google Street View and lots of help from people on the ground there.   The broker I use specializes in helping people find good value.  He seems to get new listings every few days by the handful.  I think he's the number one Re-Max broker in Philly so he obviously knows lots of people that deal with all aspects of the business there. Now I know some people would call me crazy for doing things this way, but so far things look good.  I think in some ways if I walk through a house that needs repairs I might almost get overwhelmed looking at it, but if I see pictures and then send in a couple of contractors and they tell me they can make it rent-ready for say $10-20k - then I can just run numbers and see if it makes sense.  Several deals looked good, but when the estimates came back the numbers just didn't make sense to me.   Now I'm not buying shells (there are a lot of those) just properties on decent blocks that can be ready to go in a couple of weeks.  All that said - I'm in the middle of two of these right now and we'll see how they go. One of them I'm a little nervous about but I got it on the cheap and I think it will make a good Section 8 rental.    I also have a large zip code map of Philly that I ordered on Amazon.  I went through those neighborhoods that surround the downtown core on Zillow and wrote down recent sales prices and listing prices in those zip codes, which gave me a pretty good perspective on which areas were  changing.  I've also had at least 2 people check out these properties for me.  So anyways, I'm rambling but I think you get the picture.    I almost feel like if I were there seeing busted up cabinets and smelling nasty carpet that I would get in my own way.  If I have professionals do that for me it takes a lot of that out of the equation.    Again - ask me in a month and I'll let you know how these go.  Property #1 was easy - it was in great shape and I found a good tenant within a month.  Ifind advertising the property in addition to what the management company did was better - I just used the pictures from the sales listing and reposted them back on the Postlets.  I had a dozen responses within the first 2 days.   Property # 2 should be ready to rent in a week or two.  #3 will probably take at least a month.