Fayetteville NC New Guy!

[Evan Isner]

Hello fellow BP members! 

My Name is Evan and I am currently on active duty stationed at Fort Bragg NC and looking to get started on my journey to becoming a successful Real Estate investor. This is my hello to the wide world of the Bigger Pockets network that has been shown to me by fellow local investor. I am amazed everyday by this website and what it provides. I am a fan of the BP podcast and contribute a lot of my interest in the real estate world to that podcast.

I am currently under contract with my first investment property and it is beyond exciting as well as a little nerve racking. It's a multifamily quad that I plan on doing a buy and hold, at least for the time being. My goal is to close on this property as well as purchase a single family unit by the end of this year. I have always been very risk adverse with finances and something clicked in 2019 to start branching out and exploring other possibilities, so here I am. 

While in this process of being under contract and moving closer and closer to that closing date, it seems between reading books on the subject, speaking with other investors, and just being so new to this world, more questions arise every day. My property is currently occupied with some leases expiring soon. I am considering switching Property Managers and want to make sure I ask the right questions for a new management company as well as the right questions of the current one. I would love hearing from anyone on the topic or just a hello from anyone that reads this post. 

Sincerely, 

Your new friend, Evan.
 

[Alexander Felice]

Fayetteville can be a bit of a tricky market over the last year or so because it's easy to get allured by deals that have good numbers, but aren't good deals. 

it's really important to remember that the FIRST rule of real estate continues to be "Location, location, location". I've seen many new investors in this area put together deals that look good on paper, but the houses are in such bad locations they aren't worth having at any price. @Justin Tahilramani is right to warn about those specific quads, so for any current or future potential investors in the area, the properties at aftonshire and tangora lanes are not to be purchased at any cost....they aren't worth owning if you could get them for free. There are many more like it in town, to include single family homes, that just aren't worth the headache even if it was pure profit. 

As for cash on cash return, COC is a dangerous metric because it doesn't' show true profitability it only shows the power of leverage which is nearly meaningless and often used to pump up perceived profitability. An asset with a low ROI can have a huge COC just by adding debt, but that doesn't' make it a good deal, just good debt. more than anyone else it's easiest to fool ourselves as investors that our deals are great, so be careful. Total ROI is most important if you want to analyze how good a deal is, CoC measures how good the debt is, reserves measure how hard of a storm the owner can weather, and equity measures how good the buyer purchased the deal relative to market conditions. All of these are important to consider, with COC being least important, imo.

Also for any Fayetteville/Fort Bragg investors who may see this, there are good resources in town for people who will steer you away from lousy areas (Murchison road) and try to help you understand the market. Justin is a good resource, I'm always around to talk to new people, there are meetups, etc, just make sure you're asking someone who doesn't have a financial benefit from you buying (...brokers). It's never fun when a new person brings me a deal that they are so excited about but it's just terrible and I have to tell them, but, it's better than watching someone buy a crappy deal. So email me and I'll happily buzzkill you if you need. 

OP I hope your deal works good for you, just make sure you've exhausted all your resources to make sure. Don't do it alone, and never ever go by just the numbers.