All Forum Posts by: Antonio Martinez

@Mike Lambert

I appreciate your input. I agree that Samana has much more growth, especially in the eco-tourism sphere.

We have family in PC which is also an added benefit to the purchase. I was also talking to someone else who sold two of their condos because they felt there was over saturation of AirBnBs.

I guess as long as i am cognizant that this is likely not going to be a cash positive income purchase, but rather a vacation apt with some return potential then its fine.

The numbers guy in me though, hates that idea. DR is expensive to finance in and cash outlays are huge compared to the US. The idea of property is to use as little of ones own money and it seems the DR is the complete opposite. Maybe i need to rethink this and just keep throwing as much of my money as possible to index funds which require no effort or work.

 I just got back from PC yesterday. About to pull the trigger on a 1bed pre construction condo by Noval. 

They are by far the best and biggest builders in PC right now. Do they know something we dont? What are your thoughts? 

Back in March i spent a week in Las Terrenas and the beaches are some of the best. Access was fairly easy. I agree with you that it could be a very big hotspot but it will be a long time before its anything like PC. 

Does anyone have any recs on an affordable place to buy kitchen cabinets for a rental unit reno. I bought a 2 family in NYC a fee years ago and its time i renovate the kitchen... not sure if HD is the most cost effective.

Anyone have recs for reputable/cost effective kitchen suppliers around the NYC are?

you can...i basically just found a really responsible relative and convinced them to move into our upstairs apartment for the same rent they were paying at their old place. twice the size and much more beautiful. we figured it was best to charge less than market rent and have peace of mind with someone we knew to be responsible than to try to charge market rate and play russian roulette with tenants in the Bronx. 

i thought about this as well....but i feel we are in a very different time than back in 07. we also...financially can afford our mortgage and most people that found themselves in trouble were way in over their head with adj rate mortgages and low incomes...no underwriting by the banks. we also have rental income....and from what i know most people being foreclosed on were single family homeowners who used HELOCS to buy vacations and new cars and the like. 

it is most definitly something i thought about though....just not sure it is applicable in my scenario....i dont feel i am overextended in my mortgage....and my area is actually going through significant appreciation due to real initiatives by the local govt...not just bubble mania. 

thanks for your reply....def makes me want to crunch the numbers a 3rd time though before doing this. 

i would stay away from SFH as your first purchase. you are 100% responsible for that mortgage should something happen like you lose your job or something. a multi family gives you breathing room. one thing to keep in mind is the taxes...sure the Bronx may have higher prices compared to NJ....but you can find properties in the bronx with 2-3k annual property tax rates.....while Jersey has some of the highest property tax rates in the country. factor that into your math and not just the purchase price.

hi Melida. i currently own a 2 family in the bronx and also bought i using an FHA loan. i purchased a home that was being sold FSBO. he agreed to drop the price 15k off the bat since he was saving the agents comission. i just used an attorney provided by my employers pre paid legal benefit. no agents were used.

i am biased but i think the Fordham/Jerome area is a great area to invest. Jerome Ave rezoning was just approved a month ago or so and word has it the Kingsbridge Armory renovation is about to be approved as well. 2 familys are great bc the bronx still have relatively low prices compared to the rest of NYC but rents are still HIGH so if you have a rented unit....the monthly mortgage burden is not that bad. we bought our house for 390k 3 years ago and in total we needed about 17k cash from offer to closing. the vast majority of that was just the 3.5 down payment. i negotiated to have the seller pay our closing costs and again no real estate agents were used. 

best of luck in your search. 

hi everyone,

my name is Antonio M. i am from NYC. i have always been very interested in starting a career in REI. i currently work for a major insurance company doing auto damage assessment in NYC. my wife and I currently own a 2 family home. i joined this site bc i want to soak up as much information as possible. my wife and I have comfortable decently paying jobs but we are a bit burdened with college loans...our current goal is to pay off all debt so we can focus all our money into purchasing cash flow producing real estate. i hope to learn much from all of you here and soon start setting up a good future for my 19month old son.

if you could take a look at my first post it would be great. 

https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/12/topics/608311-newbie-have-idea-of-using-heloc-to-supercharge-my-rei-start

Hello Everyone.....i just joined this forum bc as i was scouring the internet over the last couple of day this forum kept popping up as full of information. so thank you all for letting us newbies access all this wealth of info. my situation is as follows. 

current mortgage balance on 2 family home: 360k @ 3.75% for 30 years ($2300 montly PITI)

current market value by a local Credit Union: 553k

joint Debt between me and wife: 77k (majority is student debt)

Montly Debt payments: $1265.00

Rental Income from Duplex Apt upstairs: $1700.00

my idea is to get a 10/20yr HELOC for 80k to consolidate our Debt obligations and then paying only the interest on the HELOC (5%) is a 333/month payment.

basically converting our 1265.00 montly debt obligation burden into a 333.00 burden. we would be responsible for the mortgage (2300.00) and the HELOC interest payment (333.00) which is 2633.00
this minus the 1700 rental incomes makes our montly home burden 933$ dollars.

our monthly income combined is approx 6k after taxes but we also have daycare and food and car insurance and the like. 

my idea was to basically transfer and extend our current debt to a lower montly payment as we plan on moving in 1.5-2yrs and then fully renting our 2 family home which should bring in about $3500 a month conservatively (city property with 2 parking spaces). the rent of the home would cover both the mortgage and HELOC interest payment and STILL be positive cash flow

am I wrong to think that then the HELOC would basically be paid by the Tenants and not me....in a way i would have transferred our CURRENT debt to another debt vehicle which would then be paid by someone else. 

the plan after paying all of our non HOME related debt would be to save aggressively. i am thinking 2k-2.5k a month should be doable. although i have also thought about aggressively paying down the principal on our primary mortgage instead.

am i missing something. i know people dont like HELOCS bc of the variable rate...but is interest rate important when someone else is making the payments? i also know people dont like them bc you are turning unsecured debt into secured debt....but that rests on the premise that you default...i dont plan on defaulting and given our situation...it would take a series of COMBINED catastrophic events for us to find ourselves in a position where we cant pay 2600/month. 

i do understand that by using the HELOC in this manner...i end up paying a lot more over the long run but again....does it matter how much is paid when it is being paid by someone else? in a sense....instead of using CURRENT real dollars to pay our debt....we would end up paying it with future money that would have been created out of nothing (EQUITY)

what are your thoughts?

thank you all in advance for your time.