Pulse check: growing our rental business

[Johnoson Crutchfield]

Hi everyone,

Things still building strong here.  Thought I'd reach out to get some feedback on where I am at this point..... Any comments/suggestions would be appreciated.  

This month we will hit 30 units, following most of the advice from the post cast.  Our goal for 2019 is to continue the same growth from this year, and create some relationships with private money partners.  I also think it may be time to hire a full-time property manager.  How did those of you who did this decide when its time.  We eventually want to get to 80-100 units so we can serve many families and build a fully self managing business.  Our gross income right now is around 30k/month and our net cash flow right now is around 5k.  Of course our goal is to increase our operating income and net cash flow, thereby taking advantage of a growing market and benefiting the community.  

2 questions...

1) When do you know it's time to hire an employee?

2) Would anyone be interested in some private chats to provide advise around how I should expand?

[Jeff Bridges]

right now you are earning 2k/unit per year on average. Just an observation, not passing judgement. Have you considered assessing your portfolio to determine which ones are the highest maintenance headache (or time-consuming tenant, neighborhood tenant quality) or which ones have appreciated notably over your original purchase (sometimes they are both and the same) and might want to consider selling while the market is in a relatively good place? hypothetical: you could sell 2 units, take profits and use to buy a single better quality and higher cashflowing property at say 4k/year. This means you would have 29 properties with the same cashflow as before, but managing less doors, with lower maintenance headache from your 2 least favorite and most aggravating properties that allow you to spend more time/money on more quality acquisitions. Sometimes volume of houses doesn't equate to total success of your real estate investment empire. You have time to do analysis and consider preparing those for sale in the spring where they would have the chance to get top dollar. Good luck!