All Forum Posts by: Allen Wu

@Chinmay N.

I work a full time demanding W2 job, so not a big fan of brrr as it takes too much time. I try to scale my limited hours to simple criteria / investment thesis.

I bought in NW San Antonio by Helotes. I’m a buy and hold long term investor (15-30 years). So, I try to keep it simple. My simple criteria entails the following for all my purchases:

1) Must meet .8% or close to 1% rule (so need cash flow)

2) A or B+ Areas

3) Must be in an appreciation area (I bought in an area that would have potential upside since it’s by Helotes

4) Must have solid school system (7 and above) if in suburbs or in a “Hip” area that is walking distances to bars/restaurants (this applies more for downtown area investments)

Note- since I’m such a long term buy and hold investor, if any of these criteria goes side ways, I still come up on top in long run. Just need to divest if neighborhood starts deteriorating. Also, I have 12 months of reserve on each property under worst case scenarios. This way, I’m protected in downside if worst case, i get no rent / tenant for 12 months. I’m super conservative, but helps me sleep at night and continue to play this real estate game as a side hustle.

@Masood Amin

San Antonio TX and Cape Coral FL

@Ava Davis

Check out REITs or fundrise

@James Rodenberg

I self managed mine for a solid 3 years. Then, acquired a couple more properties and W2 work got super demanding, now I outsourced it all to a PM. Agree with others, if you take the plunge and self manage for a year or two, it’s a great learning experience, then just outsource to PM when you start scaling.

@Jeff Laniado

Does not come close to 1% rule. Try Cape Coral, you might get close to 1% rule at .8% on certain duplexes.

@Krystal Marquez

Cape Coral FL

@Khristopher Kyle Garay

I own two condos purchased back in 2015 in the Pasadena area. Solid gains / returns. Cash flow wise you can do better elsewhere. Both my condos are now 50-75% return.

Would I do it again? Probably not. I was clueless and had not discovered biggerpockets so went in blind. Got lucky. I now only invest in cash flowing areas with some appreciation. Markets for me are part of TX and FL. Following the masses in terms of where they are moving to.

CA also not tenant friendly. I’m blessed to be in A class area with tenants having white collar jobs. Knock on wood for no issues in future.

Good luck.

@Lucia Rushton

100% agree. I cold called and interviewed like 20 PMs, narrowed down to 3, and went with top 2 for some of my properties.

@Ryan Hurst

My wife and I also work long hours. As such, I 100% support having a PM. We have 5 units and 4 of 5 have PMs. This helps us leverage our time. I ran the math on my billable rate and it’s still cheaper to hire a PM. My time can now be spent pushing harder at my W2 and make more money to invest more into real estate. My properties are in A and B areas and still hire managers.

The single property that I manage is an outlier. But, I’ll be hiring a PM once they move out. We found a solid tenant for that one and just do not want to row the dice as rules and Reg change so much during covid and specifically in blue cities like La. hope that’s helpful.

@John Thedford

Do you still anticipate high demands for housing into 2022?