Given enough time and staying power, poor investments can turn around

[Kevin C.]

This is a follow up post to a post I made almost 5 years ago about my first two investment properties, you can read that thread here:

http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/223/topics/484...

I still have both those properties.

One my daughter and a friend are in right now.  She's in college and the house is close to where she goes to school, so it works well for her.   It's currently a loser rent wise, my choice though.  Market rent on that house is now in the $1700 range.  

The other house has had an excellent tenant in it that is in their 4th year.  She's currently paying $1455, and her rent goes to $1495 in July.   She's under market and I'm OK with it since she has been an absolute model tenant.

Both homes are now worth in the $200K range and both have market rents in the $1700+ range.   I wouldn't buy them today, way too much for the rent they bring in, but I'm in one @ $168K, the other @ $155K, so I'm OK with them both.  Payments on each of these houses are right at $470 a month.

I self manage, so no PM expenses.

Just thought I'd share to show that absolutely horrible investment choices (before I knew about BP) can work out in the end providing you have the stomach and funds to weather the storms.   Both of those houses have been trashed at least once by family and/or by regular tenants.   I've leaned a lot, I've dealt with a lot, but never gave up.  Both properties, while not ideal investments by any stretch, are now in position to cash flow quite nicely.

The hardest thing was getting off the fence.  I got off the fence, took my lumps - paid my dues I guess you could say.   

These properties were just awful investments, but they got me in the game and that's what really counts.   With what I've learned in the process, and all the wealth of knowledge available here on BP, I'm in a great position going forward.