Current Investor Strategies Discussion

[Rosie Giacosa]

Hi,

We are a husband and wife investor team from Miami. We've been investing for a couple of years and have a number of deals under out belt - buy and hold, flip, duplex conversion, vacation property (Keys). We have had a moderate amount of success but to be honest, we are struggling finding the "right" deal in the current environment. I'm sure we are not the only ones out there feeling the same way.

So, let's start a thread focused on what we see working and what we see not working in the South Florida 2016-2017 market. I feel there is enough inventory out there for those of us South Florida investors that frequent bigger pockets so let's try to not be selfish with our information so we can all benefit. OK?

I understand that we must give value to others here instead of just taking from everyone else so here goes:

• We are "real" investors trying to learn the business and purchase profitable deals yielding a return that makes the deal worthwhile. We are not scammers, trolls or thiefs. We are both professionals working in other business industries and trying to develop a profitable real estate business in South Florida. If you are similar to us, I hope you participate in this discussion.
• We are seeing professional flippers who bought up the Design District, Wynwood and Midtown districts neighborhoods east of 95 reaping quite a bit of profit. This neighborhood is now not profitable for flippers to get into. If you find a good deal on buy and hold, it may prove profitable. However, you won't find it on the MLS. Most likely you will have to direct mail to find any good deal. I would say this neighborhood is 30-40% renovated.
• The Little River corridor is also now priced out for flippers. There seems to be plenty of inventory that is not being marketed because a) the current owners don't want to move or b) investors are holding on to the properties and letting them appreciate. I would say that this neighborhood is 50% renovated already.
• We are finding that wholesalers have some deals but in C or D neighborhoods with at least a 3-5 year horizon before there is the possibility of upgrading given current demographic growth and direction. Also, the spread that wholesalers seem to be leaving for the investor/flipper is about 20% for build out. This is WAY too little to make the deal worthwhile as you'll be lucky to eeck out $10K - $15K on a deal, much less if you have to hold the property.
• Buy and hold strategy is becoming more the go to strategy with SFR instead of the flips. We see that continuing through 2017.
• No idea about commercial strategies.
• We've also been pointed to become hard money lenders. That may be proving profitable if you're the type that is OK getting a 10% return on your money passively. It's not for us at this time.

OK that's it for me. How about you? What are you seeing? What's working? What's not?

Let's help each other make some profits.

Thanks,

Art