All Forum Posts by: Keith Miller

I have a property I'm wondering what you guys think about here in Missoula. It's 622 W. Artemos, recently listed for $348K. It's $105 per sq ft, that's well below what it currently costs to build. Then there's the view, it's high enough on the hill to look out over the whole valley. But the most appealing part of it is the lot is 18,252 sq ft, enormous for the Missoula area. It's zoned as R5.4, similar to the rest of the U district. That means that I couldn't pull off building any townhouses on the lot, but with one that large, I could theoretically fit in 3 full lots. The minimum lot size for R5.4 is 5400 sq ft. How the house is situated however, it's hard to see 3 lots that aren't super thin and crazily shaped. But one substantial lot could be easily be divided and either sold off, or just built upon. I've attached a picture showing a rough idea of how that could be done.

To get to the point, I think this could be a really easy flip. Simply buy the house, spend 2-3 months doing a boundary line relocation, then resell the house and the new lot separately. I've checked the comps, and the cheapest lot in that area is over $80K. I've already talked to my realtor that said the value of the current house would not be substantially reduced if the lot was reduced from 18K square feet to 12K. Or, better yet, make it a live-in flip while we update the house and make it beautiful, then Airbnb or rent the main house, and either sell or build on the new lot. The main drawback is the steepness of the lot. You can check the Google Street view to get a better idea of it. There would need to be a lot of excavation to create a driveway for the new lot, and steep lots are not an area of expertise of mine. But it seems like there's plenty of extra cash in this deal to pay for that. 

I'd love to hear any feedback you guys have on this, what do you all think?

I'm a Missoula Montana real estate investor and am interesting in networking, as well as finding anyone wholesaling or engaged in direct mailing and/or other lead generation. Anyone have any leads, or know of anyone?

Hey Jess,

I'm an investor here in Missoula, and this sounds like it could be a good deal. It's not quite a 1% deal, but that's a difficult standard to hit here in Missoula. When you say it's a great location, where specifically do you mean? I was born and raised Missoula so know the area pretty well. 

But even if this property is gone, I'd be interested in hearing your success with finding off market deals, that's one of my main focuses right now. I'm about to start construction on a duplex in my backyard on Dixon street near Brooks, then will start focusing on finding off market deals after that is done in January. I'd love to hop on the phone and chat if you're available, I'd love to discuss how we can help each other.

Keith 

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment.

Purchase price: $327,000
Cash invested: $33,000

Bought as our home, then immediately built a separate entrance to the basement and have been running as an Airbnb ever since. The Airbnb brings in around $3,500 if half the mortgage is included as an expense, $13,500 if that's taken out. Either way, it helps pay most of the mortgage.

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

The real reason I bought this house is that it sits on a 12,000+ square foot lot. I've just submitted my permit to the city to build a duplex in the backyard, and am planning on breaking ground in September, and be done by December. One side will be two bedroom, the other side one bedroom. I plan on running them as Airbnbs. Will likely move out soon after the duplex is completed, to the U district.

I'm a beginning investor who is turning my single family home into a triplex. I installed a door to create a separate entrance to the finished basement, which we are now Airbnbing, while my wife, son, and I live upstairs. I'm just finishing up the permitting to convert the detached two-car garage into a small single bedroom apartment, so it will be a total of three units. What I'd like to do is buy a new house and move into it, and Airbnb all three units in our current house. My current job is a 54K per year teacher, with a wife who takes car of our kid, so our income is fairly low. I know that I'm going to have a hard time getting a conventional loan from a bank for our new house, as our debt to income ratio is high. We currently owe 260K on the house, after putting 20% down. We'd ideally like to buy a similar home, in the same neighborhood of Missoula, MT, and repeat the process of turning it into a triplex. What I'd like your help on is identifying what other options I have besides a conventional bank loan. Can you help me out?