All Forum Posts by: Anthony Zayas

As others have mentioned, certain factors play a role into investing in the Temple area. Having house hacked in the area for almost 4 years, finding renters (students) definitely comes in waves usually starting in the summer months, and again around December when students are forced to renew their lease for the next year. Outside these months, the chances of finding quality student renters is extremely low. 

Currently as others have mentioned, the supply in the area is ridiculously high as most students are living home. This has caused prices per room to drop from 700 - 650 for higher finish properties to 500-600 or even lower. However, excluding the events of covid(decrease in student pop), the growing attendance of the university positions the area as a good buy/hold opportunity simply because of the limited supply (even taking into account all the new apartment developments). 

Within temple university area, there is a sub market of renters located on the eastern side of broad st. The access to the regional rail makes commuting to center city and beyond extremely easy. Thus opens that area to renters who are not students. Typical cap rates are around 13% or more. However, I find this is to be on a block by block basis. 

Additionally, there was an ordinance passed in the early 2000's which restricted areas that are allowed to be rented by non owner occupied buildings but this is never enforced(nor known of). The northern zone is 13th - 11th, and diamond to susquehanna. There exist another south of cecil b moore. 

Thank you! Hopefully I can close before the year is over!

Thank you! Luckily I was fortunate to be in a financial situation to invest in real estate. Now I am trying to compound and am working on my 3rd deal within this year! 

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment in Philadelphia.

Purchase price: $70,000
Cash invested: $30,000

My first and current house-hack property done while I was a university student. Purchased for 70,000, now worth 125,000 all while I pay nothing towards the mortgage.

What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

I was attending university while spending $500 in rent within the area. After doing math, I realized I could be allocated that money to a mortgage instead, and get a roommate to foot the bill. This lead me to researching potential properties. Resulting in a door to door campaign looking for individuals willing to sell their property.

How did you find this deal and how did you negotiate it?

After doing research and driving by the area to map current and possibly future developments. I narrowed down my focus to a few streets. One day, me and my mother made paper flyers with my mother's personal information. From a phycological standpoint, we figured having a woman go door to door dropping flyers off would be less intimidating. This strategy resulted in us coming into contact with an individual who owned multiple properties in the area and wanted to cash-out on one of them.

How did you finance this deal?

This deal was financed with an investment loan at 5.2%.

What was the outcome?

After living and fixing up the property over the course of 3 years. The property was now appraised at $125,000. I ended up taking out a conventional loan of $118,000 at 3.125% to purchase the property from my mother. This resulted in us having ~70,000 in equity which me and my mother used to purchase another property for 70,000 cash. This property is currently in rehab phase.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

The whole process of living in the property has taught me various skills from laying down wood flooring, to installing light fixtures and tile work. While I did pay individuals to do most of the work within the property. I also learned to just have a go-at-it attitude, as YouTube is a valuable resource.