All Forum Posts by: Brad Piper

I just purchased a property that I intend to rent out. I am a Realtor so I can list it as a residential lease on the MLS, but are there better and/or more efficient ways to get renters in there? I am trying to avoid using a property management company!

I'm both an investor and a full-time Realtor here in DFW. The Book on Rental Property Investing by Brandon Turner really prepared my mind well when I started investing. In that book Brandon really prepares your mind well for things to be constantly thinking of, things to be watching out for, and things to be expecting/not expecting. 

I'd be happy to chat more if you have questions about the investor market around DFW!

Brandon Turner did a great little lesson on how to create your own font and send a simple mailer out! I linked the URL for that below. Creating the font only took me about an hour, and then I took a few hours to go through addresses, look up the owners in tax records, and add their names/addresses to a word document. Another idea you can do, is have your letter template wording in separate excel cells, then plug in the owner name and address, then concatenate each specific owner name/address with your general wording, and that way you can quickly compile all of the text you want into a new cell, then copy and paste that into a word document. 

I'm interested to hear what works best for you!

https://www.biggerpockets.com/...

David, that's awesome stuff. Thank you so much for that! Given your experience I'm sure you have folks lined up, but if you were looking for new representation, where would you go? 

To all my investors out there, what are the top qualities you look for in a good real estate agent? Are you looking for someone who is also an investor? Are you looking for a big brokerage? Are you looking for someone who is always available? Let me know!

Sacha, I echo what Brandon said. Most personal/small business CPAs should be able to help you both strategize how to structure your business from a tax perspective, as well as help you work through all the necessary forms and filings to make your businesses legal structure as efficient as possible.

Andy, I would recommend contacting a local banker. Many good regional banks are SBA-approved, and they will have the intimate resources to have you determine the best course of action. The big bank chains will be SBA approved, but it will probably be harder to be able to sit down with someone and always be asking them questions.

There are a couple answers to this, one is math-based and one is not. Mathematically, it should be relatively easy to run your numbers and see what your return-on-investment is. As long as the ROI% on that money is GREATER than the interest rate that you're paying on the debt, then mathematically it makes sense to invest...that's whether you're investing in real estate, the stock market, gold, beanie babies, whatever.

The qualitative answer involves where you and your family are financially. Do you want to save up for a vacation? kid on the way? surgery coming up? Depending on the level of financial impact events that you have on the horizon, you might re-think taking on something somewhat risky like real estate investing while you still have some debt.

All-in-all, you should be "responsibly leveraged." Just about anyone can find someone to give them a loan and get "leveraged," but to be RESPONSIBLY leveraged is different. If you all have a clean financial horizon, I say go invest that money and make minimum payments on your debt. Debt is tool/resource when paid off responsibly and used correctly. 

I would generally recommend getting your credit in order first. Having bad credit will be a roadblock in so many ways, both in your investing journey as well as your own life in other areas, get that credit in order and you'll have plenty of time to invest!

Congrats Nathan! I've been looking pretty hard daily at properties. I'm a realtor so I'm naturally around real estate constantly, but I haven't yet pulled that trigger on my first investment property.