Where do I start? My journey began as most was with the BP podcast @Brandon Turner and dozens of real estate books. After Brie Schmidt’s second interview came on BP came out, I thought I needed to connect with her as she sounded like the real deal. Little did I know; she (@Brie Schmidt) was much much more than that.

Long story short, I saw just over a dozen or so properties with Brie and her partner Charlie Shields. I had one offer that was $10K over asking get rejected and finally pulled the trigger in a 4-unit (legal 2 flat) in West Logan Square. I must say here to everyone starting out, the reason I was comfortable was because Brie and Charlie mentored me along the way outlining what makes sense for my vision. This was invaluable information that reading all the books in the world could not do for me.

I closed on the building in September 2018, approximately 2 years after first considering real estate as an investment and 16-months after viewing my first property. I used a 5% conventional loan with a final purchase price of $485,000 for a 4-unit building.

Doing one unit at a time, working a full-time 50-hr/wk jo, I managed to rehab and rent each of the four units in just less than a year.

See the detailed analysis below.

Note: I spent $42K in rehab and 6K in miscellaneous building expenses. This included 2-bathroom gut rehabs and one gut kitchen (except flooring). New flooring and trim in all living and bedroom areas. New stainless-steel appliances in each unit and in-unit W/D in one unit.

Mild Headaches:

First day introducing myself and dropping off a welcome letter (outlining rent payments, expectations, etc.) it turned out every unit in the building spoke Spanish. No English just Spanish. After trying to use broken Spanish from high school I discovered Google Translate which saved me
Christmas Day I was in Iowa and got pictures of the basement unit (my most recent completed rehab) that had flooded. I was lucky to get a plumber out to fix the issue (tree root in the sewer line) within 2 hrs for <$700
Winter freeze – a tenant left the door to the basement open (where the laundry is) and 5 pipes burst. Very lucky that I was able to access a shut-off valve adjacent and didn’t have to shut off the water main

Things I learned:

Showing the unit – I learned a lot about myself. I read all the posts and book on managing rentals by B Turner and this still was the worst part. ~33% flaked the day of or were >15min late. I value my time WAY TOO much to do this ever again (remember I work a full-time job that includes weekends and is inflexible)
Value bedroom size. Of the 7 bedrooms, 2 were 8’x10’ and 1 was 8’x8’. This hurts it from a showability standpoint (people will come and love it until the bedrooms). This also hurt me ~$150-200/mo from comparables
Its all about who you know. I am a physical therapist and have developed connections with several general contractors who are absolutely amazing and have saved me thousands of dollars. Because we developed a personal relationship, they gave me their personal contacts without having to pay them as the middleman. For example, they saved me up to 40-60% on cabinets from Studio 41 because of the work they do with the GC. It pays to hire out certain work and know people. I commonly worked on Sunday with the people I hired out and I was then able to utilize their “friends” and other people they know to help with certain aspects of the rehab after I developed a relationship with the workers
Being a landlord isn’t bad at all. The headaches aren’t bad, and it comes with the asset. Plus, you get to learn a ton of things along the way.
Real estate is the best vehicle for financial independence

Thank you most to Brie Schmidt and Charlie. I couldn’t do any of this and be successful as I was with you. Lastly, thank you to the BP community and all of the resources that are put out. Now I have a nicely cash flowing asset in a hopefully gentrifying area (West Logan Square) of Chicago!

Now for everyone's favorite, before and afters!!

Basement: