All Forum Posts by: Brandon Kanakis

Does anyone have any experience purchasing REO's or preforclosures in Virginia for flips or to use a rentals? Are there any gotcha's I need to be aware of either from a legal perspective or financial perspective? It seems like you can acquire properties cheaper, generally in decent condition and if it is a preforeclosure you are actually helping people out in a financially difficult time by preventing them from having to declare bankruptcy.

Yep did some digging about the IRA investing in property and I am 100% not taking that solution. You are not allowed to work on your own units because it is considered sweat equity and viewed as a form of payment into the IRA? Can't say I am comfortable with purchasing a property, paying others to do the work (substantially increase cost and cutting margins). At this point I would have to find some seriously amazing deals for that, where as if I can buy a property that is slightly distressed and fix it up on my own, since it is my own sweat equity, greatly increase the returns by factoring out labor costs.

@Kelly Hall That sounds like a lovely idea. I have very little experience drafting business plans, still trying to figure out how to perform market analysis on various neighborhoods throughout the Richmond and Greater Richmond areas.

Alright what am I failing to do here to mention people as I reply to them?

@Bernard Reisz
I have very little self employment income from Uber, but it pulls in chump change compared to my 9-5 employment. For the self directed IRA, can I transfer money from a traditional IRA into that account and purchase properties tax free?

Beyond retirement investing, what if I wanted to start a rental business? Would these solo 401k accounts or self directed IRA's be able to fund the start up of a business that I create?

Kelly that would be very nice. I know virtually nothing about crafting business plans. At the moment I was just thinking buy a single property. See if I can renno it to cash flow and allow myself to pull out some equity then maybe form an LLC and transfer the asset to the LLC. At that point I could consider doing business plans and learning how to grow the LLC. It seems like a lot of people investing in their local market can manage their properties up to 10-20. But beyond that they need to start hiring out a lot of stuff.

I am aware of that but a majority of my IRA is traditional with vanguard. I am not sure I am comfortable taking the tax hit at the moment. I figured when I am nearing retirement I can do partial conversions to a Roth and perhaps transfer some of the Roth to a self directed custodian. I do not want to deplete my stock exposure.

Building a real estate business does seem like a cool idea but for now I just want to take it slow and steady. I am a new born deer in a world full of wolves. I need to get my feet underneath me before I can run swiftly

My name is Brandon Kanakis-Pennell. I am from Richmond Virginia as you can see from the post subject. My experience in real estate has been literally investing in REITs, crowd funding loans, and purchasing my primary residence and renovating pretty much every room of the house over the years with my wife.

I am a new father. My daughter is 7 weeks old now. As a career I am a professional penetration tester. I currently assess web applications for security vulnerabilities. I'm hoping to shortly move over to a position where I play a bad actor and attack organizations entire networks.

My goal with real estate is to supplement or replace my income. I have a worry that 10-15 years from now I will burn out or grow jaded with my professional industry as many of my older colleagues have become. 

I enjoy working on homes, it allows me to use another part of my brain in addition to it being physical work that I can see and created with my own hands. I like the idea that as my portfolio grows, I can literally put in as much work as I want up front and reap the reward of working less as I go on or choosing what projects to engage in. There is something amazing about being free to work when you choose.

I ran across BiggerPockets last year while searching for investing podcasts. I've been a heavy individual stock as well as mutual fund/etf investor in the stock market. I'm currently maxing my 401k contributions and believe by the end of the year I can max my IRA contributions as well. Since I have a majority of my wealth in the stock market, I am seeking alternative investment vehicles which offer diversification. Real estate seems like a great one that allows me to get physical when I need to, offers great tax advantages for the individual taxable income side of investing, and it doesn't directly correlate to the stock market. Last but not least I love the fact that you can actually measure and predict returns in ways that are far easier than the stock market.

I hope to use BP to network with others, potentially partner with seasoned investors and learn the many facets of the real estate business. I am pretty sure that I want to start out with Single Family Homes. I am familiar with these, as a home owner myself. I know how to do a vast amount of remodeling save for major electrical work and structural repair or modification. I am very interested in being a buy and hold investor, however I am not opposed to flipping occasional homes if the market is right and the capital/time seem to fit. My biggest fear in the real estate world is getting hit with some legal issue either from the standpoint of running a business, some deal going wrong, or a tenant related problem probably resulting in eviction.

In terms of where I stand, I have almost completed reading Brandon Turners book on Rental Property Investing. I'm starting to get comfortable with analyzing deals. I have just under 20k in cash reserves to purchase a SFH using a 20% down conventional rental mortgage. So I am getting close to being able to buy at least a 100k property (though I would shoot 70/80% value of listing price) and am certainly looking for some fixer uppers (Love the idea of a project house). If I could get some in the Upper Reservoir District that would be amazing. I do not currently have interest in investing out of state. I'd rather throw money at an E-REIT or something that is a bigger unit project.

I do not know what else to say at this time, but I can say this is the first time I've actually engaged in the forums. I've been much just been a silent reader and a non-contributing member. I think that as I get closer to being ready to engage in the world of Real Estate, I will have to come out of my shell a bit.