In need of creative Ideas on how to make a property cash flow

[Trevor Farmer]

I purchased a triplex in Salem Oregon at the end of 2016 for 270,000. It was a dump when I first got it, realtor sign was knocked over and graffitied, paint peeling off the exterior, 5 different types of flooring from front door to the back sliding glass, all walls were Mexican restruant yellow, rents were $600-660. My parents begged me to walk away from it but I saw it had good bones. A good floor plan, and most importantly allot of parking and shop area for my day to day automotive job I work from home. 

Fast forward about three years and I’m gearing up to buy my second multi family home. My rents are 1200 each now (living in one and still making about $900 cash flow after all bills are paid) My 270k triplex is now worth around 420ish and I can easily do a cash out refi to pull 100k down for a second purchase. Unfortunately for the last few months I’ve been searching most of the property’s numbers don’t seem to work out in my head (not sure if I’m having great expectations due to my first deal going so well) I just saw a triplex in an area I wouldn’t wanna live in for $390,000 with rents at $750, or 2250 total, the mortgage with 100k down would be just over 2000 bucks, add water sewer and garbage on it and you have a solid loss, plus with rent control passing earlier this year it would take about 2-3 years to clean the place up and get rents to where it’s making enough money to be worth while. 

I’m not going to jump into a bad deal but I also don’t wanna sit around and loose time that I could be doing something that will work out in the long run. Any suggestions, pointers or things to look for? My uncle told me when it gets like that just to make offers that would make money if bought and if they don’t wanna sell them at a reasonable price make offers on others till one works out.