Landing my first real rental/flip - advice on how to sell?

[Adrian Tilley]

Hi all,

I've been at the "education" part of this game for a while, got some marketing capital together, and now am on the cusp of closing on my first real investment property.  A friend's mother passed away and he's unloading her rentals.  I'm under contract on a condo that's currently being used as a rental.  I'm hoping some of you might have some thoughts on what the best way to handle it.

ARV is $150-$160k. Here in the Denver market that's really low - it's in a good part of town in Westminster, Colorado. It's a 2 bed/2 bath in decent shape (could use some updating, but it's ok as is). Would probably need $10k of fix up.

Currently rented for $1025/month, but the lease is up at the end of May, tenants want to stay (they've been good so far), and I think it could be rented at $1150-1200 easily, with significant cash flow.  

Would I be better off kicking the tenants and selling on the MLS (or the BP marketplace :) or keeping the tenants in place, bringing rents up to market, and selling?

I've thought of just keeping it as a rental - the numbers are pretty good - but I think at this point I'd rather have the money to use for marketing.

Thanks for any help!

Adrian