Multifamily first deal goal advise

[Shlomi Mor]

Hi there , 

I don’t own any real estate yet , but I want to get my first property this year as I have a nice amount for down payment . My initial goal was to buy a 2 family home in LOng island and house hack but the down payment is so much and taxes are too high in my opinion we would basically pay the same in the city and it’s just adding no commute for me which is not ideal. 

My goal I daily write is to own 100 apartments units . 

I decided to focus only on Multifamily units and scale up hoping for first purchase of 8-10 units find something with add on  raise rents cash out refinance and then perhaps go to 20-25 units . 

I live in New York City . 

I have a few things I need help with . 

1. Area to focus on Multifamily 8-10 units only for finding deals not too far from NYC up to 2-3 hours drive in the 1-2 million dollar range and down payment up to 300k ?

2. What website I can best look for multifamily deals,? 

3. Any advise you can have for me as a first time investor going to multifamily? Do you think jumping in to 8-10 units on first deal is too much ?

any advise would be welcome. 

[Akshay Nihalaney]

@Shlomi Mor - I was in a similar situation as you are a couple of years ago.

I started investing in Albany, NY last year. Bought a 3-family first, and 6 months later two more 2-families. I'm now looking for an 8-15 unit multi-family.

When you're first starting out, there are lot of things you don't know; so in my experience it's better to start off with a smaller multi-family, learn the workings of running a business (it's never a completely passive business), build your team and build credibility in the area you're investing in. It might be inefficient as your scale is smaller, but you get a lot of 2nd chances and gain valuable experience over time. Once you stabilize, the smaller ones you can move to bigger multi-families. 

The other alternative would be find a partner, who has done bigger multi-families, understands it and has a team already. You can piggy-back on their knowledge and experience to jump-start yours.

I'm not saying, you shouldn't jump into bigger multi-families on your own as each person have their own risk tolerance, time commitment (I was doing it with my full-time job) and other factors. I'm just relaying my experience.

Smaller multi-families you can check out realtor.com, zillow, redfin, etc. You might find some 6-10 units there too.

For bigger multi-families, try loopnet, crexi. I've heard lot of bigger ones don't even make it to these and the brokers usually have a network of buyers whom they reach out to. Depending on the area you will need to reach out to agents dealing with multi-families. 

Hope this helps.

Good luck!