Scaling Up from SFH to MFH

[Jon Kelly]

What was the 1st (and maybe 2nd and 3rd) thing you did to scale your business from SFHs into MFHs of 16+ units? 

Next month, I will be closing on my 15th property and will have 33 doors. I started ~3 years ago and have slowly acquired properties every few months. I own SFHs, duplexes, triplexes, a quadplex and an 8-unit property. I'm interesting in scaling up and purchasing larger, 16+ units, MFHs. 

Thanks in advance for sharing your story and advice!

[Will Fraser]

Hey @Jon Kelly, well done good sir!  That's a great level of growth and one that is inspiration to the hoards of us that fill our heads with excuses and reasons that we can't scale.  Atta boy!

I currently have NOT closed on these, but I am in talks with the seller on a 20+ unit and a 12+ unit and these will be my first north of the 4 unit line.  I pursued a 75 unit, 108 unit, a and a 126 unit previously but found the barriers to entry to be unwieldy to a newbie in the space.  What has been interesting about the 12+ and 20+ complexes is that funds are flocking to them and few investors have looked at me with that, "WTF are you talking about?  You can't do that?  You never have, and that's crazy!" look.  

So, I'm hopeful that the process continues to go smoothly and complete, but either way there is a cool principal at play --> as I grew in competence with SFR and duplexes-quads it grew awareness of the products, understanding of their shortcoming and the power of jumping into the missing middle space, and that gave me educational fodder to pass along to my sphere of investors.

Add to this that it's not an exponential change from my current operation (for example, if you jump from 33 doors to 33+16-plex then that doesn't seem as crazy as jumping from 33 to 33+96-plex), so it was more palatable and logical for the would-be financial partners.

Then it comes down to educating the people around you about WHY and how, then it becomes lighter and easier.