The ideal multi-family investing customer

[Samuel Sedore]

Hey BP, I'am in the process of trying to put together some market research on Multi-family investors mainly 2-10 units. If everyone could chime in and give some answers it would be great, I would be happy to share my findings at the end with everyone.

I'am looking for the biggest Fears, Frustrations, Worries and wants of the average investor who purchases these types of properties. 

My goal here is to find some correlation between these answers from person to person, and then develop a strategy to service these needs both as a realtor and for future Joint venture deals as an investor.

I find so often we don't even know what our customers want before we decide to try and give it to them.

[Roy N.]

@Samuel Sedore

I see 2-4 unit properties (even 5 or 6 units in many cases) as really being residential properties and you are frequently dealing with unsophisticated vendors and real estate agents whose bread & butter is selling pretty houses to Dick & Jane and who have no experience in how to sell to an investor.

When you step into small multiunit apartments (say 6 - 30 units), my biggest frustration is the number of vendors/agents who bring a property to market as they would an SFR, rather than taking the time to prepare a memorandum of offering and a professional package comprising financial (2-3+ years), operational & marketing data, service contracts, etc.

While I understand that one will still encounter a surprising number of unsophisticated investors in this asset class, I am disappointed in the {predominately residential} real estate agents who catch and list a small multi-unit property in anticipation of a big payday (4-6% of $1million+), but can't be bothered to do a professional job.  These folks would add more value it they referred the Vendor a competent commercial broker and went back to selling pretty houses.