Minneapolis Duplex - Analysis Results Comparison

[Oscar Brooks]

Hey BP Community,

I'm looking for my first investment property (hoping to owner occupy a duplex) and am trying to heed the advice I've heard on BP webinars, podcasts, and read on the site to make sure the numbers work. In the last month I've crunched numbers on about 20 properties and I got positive cash flow from only 1. I'm hoping that folks can check my results against what they get and give feedback on my analysis. Am I too conservative? Am I not taking some other benefits into account? Any advice is appreciated.

Property: $380k - 2bd 2bth in each unit, 1300 sq ft, 1 garage spot

Rents: $2550 - $1250 and $1300 for the units

Mortgage: $1746.07/mo - 30 yr, FHA, 3.5% down, 4%

Mortgage Insurance: $268/mo - 0.85% of loan amount

Insurance: $100/mo - I'm just ballparking this number

Water: $155/mo

Trash: $155/mo - seems high but this is what is in the listing

Property Tax: $459/mo - crazy expensive

Maintenance: $191 - 7.5% of rental income, 70 year old home

Vacancy: $128 - 5% of rental income

2% rule of thumb: Fail

50% rule of thumb: Fail

Cashflow: -$673

By my calculations, in order to get $100 in cashflow per unit per Brandon Turner's suggestion I'd have to get this property for $252k at the current rents. Even if I got 3k in rental income I'd still need to pick up the property at $289k.

I'd love to know what you all think of my numbers.

Thanks!

[Tony Otis]

What neighborhoods are you looking in? This looks pretty typical of something in the Uptown area. The prices just aren't what they need to be in that area to make a good investment property. 

Also, when making a 3.5% down payment, you'll be very leveraged, which will typically make a mediocre deal even worse. I bet if you plug in a 20% down payment and get rid of the PMI, you'll start to see a lot more positive cash flows on the same properties. But still poor cash on cash return.