Long Distance Investing Success Story

[Brendan Perlee]

Almost three years ago I wrote my first forum post, hoping the BiggerPockets community could help me make a decision I had been struggling with. At that time, in 2013, I found myself in an interesting situation; I was working for a very successful developer in the New York City area but I knew that was short-lived. My ever-present entrepreneurial spirit had always been accompanied by a love of real estate, architecture and design, so it was inevitable that someday I would begin developing on my own.

In 2013 I took the first step toward fulfilling that dream. From the beginning, however, fell into a trap that so many other BiggerPockets members have echoed. I live in New Jersey, consistently one of the most expensive states in the country to call home. I didn’t have the capital needed to purchase a property that met my criteria. I read plenty of forum posts telling me that high acquisition costs shouldn’t be a deterrent because capital will always find a true deal. In reality, I struggled to make the numbers work. I considered looking in more affordable markets but the possibility of not seeing my project on a daily basis scared me.

Fast forward two years, I had still taken no action. My father and step-mother had recently retired and moved to the southwest coast of Florida (Sarasota, Venice, Englewood area). While visiting them in mid-2015, I decided I had wasted enough time talking about my future plans--it was time to act. During that trip, I identified the perfect property and was under contract to purchase before flying home.

As I approach the end of my first full year of being an ACTIVE real estate investor, my second project just hit the market. Both have been a learning experience, a financial success, and a springboard to the lifestyle I had envisioned.

I felt it was important to tell my story because I know the hurdles of starting and running a business are real. I can never repay BiggerPockets for the vast resource they provide, I can only pay it forward. With that said, here are the most important lessons I learned in year one:

• Working in a market other than where you live is difficult, but it’s not impossible. Before I invested one dollar in my first project I made sure I had a trusted team in place. I hired good contractors with strong references and together we generated a thorough, detailed scope of work. I may not have been on property every day but that scope of work answered countless questions when I was not there to do so.
• I brought my father and step-mother aboard to act as my eyes and ears when I wasn’t there. They have very little experience, if any, with this type of work but I trust them to look out for my best interests. If a problem ever arose, they were able to refer to that scope of work (see a trend here?). If further clarification was needed I was just a phone call or FaceTime away.
• It’s amazing how things change over a year. At this time last year I was scraping together the capital needed to purchase and renovate my first project. Today I’m hoping to close 2016 by managing two projects simultaneously, each at a price point that once seemed impossible.
• If I wanted to, I could give up on the Sarasota-Venice-Englewood market and focus on New Jersey. That might make things easier, but I would have to forfeit the market knowledge I gained and the relationships I have built. To me those are two of the biggest keys to success in business and they should be nurtured, not abandoned.

In closing, do whatever you need to do to get started. If that means working in a market that’s 1,200 miles from your front door, do it. One year later you’ll look back and wonder what there was to be afraid of.