All Forum Posts by: Ben Penwell

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment.

Purchase price: $130,000
Cash invested: $48,000

First investment property, turn key and already rented.
This helped me learn a ton, built my team, and set me up for my second deal, which I'm requiring to be better than my first.

Here's my numbers: https://www.instantlyanalyze.com/product/instantlyreport/share/b354a5b3-808e-4f70-8675-7313016ac051

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

Turnkey deal covering the mortgage in the first month.

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

On Zillow, through my agent.

How did you finance this deal?

30% down using conventional

How did you add value to the deal?

I didn't... there was some differed maintenance, so I put another $7k into it.

What was the outcome?

A roughly breakeven deal after significant tax and insurance increases.
Insurance is going down a bit in August, but yeah this deal wasn't that great after budgeting.

I'm positioned perfectly for a refinance whenever rates hit 4% to get more cashflow or pull money out for my next deal.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

There's a lot to learn for future deals:
- Buy something you can add value
- My first PM sucked and it took over a year to raise rents. Thankfully they got absorbed by another PM company who is much better.
- I didn't have any contractors I used for this deal. Next deal I need to learn the contractor part of investing.

Did you work with any real estate professionals (agents, lenders, etc.) that you'd recommend to others?

Yeah, my agent is Amy Kastan: https://www.homepagerealty.com/agents/amy-kastan/
My current PM, who is great, is Property Management of Louisville: https://www.pmofl.com/

That’s great news!

How many units do you have over there?

I ask because I’m looking for any advice you may have regarding properly managing units in the west end. The obvious downside is large unit turn costs. I haven’t dealt with a turn on my unit, the lady living there views it as her dream house for her 4 kids. I think she’d live there for 5-10 years if I let her. To me that SEEMS like the right move with section 8 tenants, because each turn is likely to cost a lot… I’m still looking for related posts to how to make sure I avoid the horror stories of these section 8 markets. 

Thanks again for your time!

Hey! I invest in the west end. Have a unit on the south side of park hill and under contract with another in south parkland. 
i’ve seen you post a ton for Louisville, and wanted to know your thoughts on these neighborhoods? I see a lot of renovated units here and the crime maps show them as much lower crime rates, but I wanted to get your perspective since your an expert on this area.

The positive news you post about the area is uplifting and I hope is a signal of the area’s revitalization!