From 4-Unit Apartment to 200+ Unit Boat & RV Storage (1031 Story)

[Greg Bond]

Investment Info:

Industrial commercial investment investment in Deland.

Purchase price: $1,075,000
Cash invested: $500,000

This is an RV & Boat Storage Investment!

I utilized the 1031 Exchange from a 4-plex small apartment to buy this property with another investor.

We ended up buying the neighboring property and using a commercial loan to expand the facility from 98 parking spots to 200+!

This has been one of my favorite projects yet 👍🏼

What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

I was always in Single-Family Rentals but started to feel my portfolio was not balanced enough. After getting hit pretty hard in 2008, I wanted to get into an asset class that was more resistant to economic downturns. I was at a storage talk at my local REIA and heard it performed the best of any real estate asset class during the downturn. Thus, I started looking and talking about storage non-stop until I found one!

How did you find this deal and how did you negotiate it?

I found this deal through a broker friend. The owners were older and wanted to retire.

How did you finance this deal?

They owners gave us owner financing on the deal which was really sweet!

How did you add value to the deal?

We raised rents, automated their systems, and bought 8.8 acres of the surrounding land to expand the facility.

They previous owners still ran credit cards manually!

What was the outcome?

This has been one of the best deals I have done and currently are in lease-up mode since the expansion was just completed a month or so ago.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

Hiring the best staff makes all the difference. We hired one manager who didn't work out and then we hired another one who is an all-star.