Rental Property Cities?

[Oday Hoorani]

Dear all,

My name is Oday, and I just jumped onto real estate investment. I am currently living in Calgary and looking for rental investment properties. 

After doing some research, and draft math - Im having trouble finding good deals around. Calgary's market is down, however its still too expensive to break even for a rental property. I have looked into different cities, and its almost the same thing. 

Mainly its due to the high purchasing price along with an average mortgage rate of 2.5 - this raise expenses to almost break even with the average rent rate. I am mostly looking for properties around universities (constant supply of tenants).

Does anyone have an advice for me of where to look? which cities? I found that the Canadian market is not really friendly for investment (Compared to the US for example). Am I the only one? or is everyone facing the same problem? 
Please share your knowledge and cities recommendations.

Thanks! 

[Steve R.]

my rentals in Calgary are cash flowing even with the rents down right now.  I have never considered student market since seems it is very seasonal (8 months out of a year) and thus vacancies and turnover, and that they would have to be made much more tenant-proof against students (plywood under drywall to avoid holes in the walls, etc).  It is possible to find properties in Calgary to cash flow, just do not concentrate on expensive areas.  I am not talking NE, but even there are some decent areas and not as expensive as SW and NW.  Consider SE such as Ogden (city train in the plans there, Glenmore trail should be finished this year, and lots of factories and offices not far from there), Erin Woods, Applewood.  The market has already started recovering, we should see some positive impact this summer, but the recovery will take a while, we lost too much ground in the last two years.

Good luck