All Forum Posts by: Brian Loibl

Welcome @Kalvin Seidl to the BP community! There's a lot of unknowns, but that's part of the excitement. I bought my first house hack in NE Minneapolis in December and have learned more than anything I found online. Feel free to reach out if you want to chat. Best of luck!

@Jake Hilden welcome back to the BP community. House hacking is a great opportunity, I just got my first one in NE Minneapolis at the end of 2019 and it has taught me so much already. Its great that your looking into multiple streams of income, but I've found that trying to do too many things can sacrifice quality. My strategy is to hone in on REI and get so good at it that it comes easy which then frees up time and mental space to explore other streams of income. I'm fairly new so I always admit that I could be wrong, but I'm going forward with a plan (not getting stuck in analysis paralysis) and can always make adjustments on the fly. If you would like to chat about REI or anything (I to am interested in online businesses just not primary focus right now) feel free to reach out.

@Thomas Piersiak welcome to the BP community. I actually purchased my first property, a house hack, in NE Minneapolis at the end of 2019. I spent a lot of time going through many of the resources BP and others offer, but found that actually getting into the property was hands down the best way to cement my knowledge. @Tim Swierczek helped me get the FHA 203K as the property didn't meet the standard FHA requirements, plus it's a great way to wrap the rehab costs into the loan so you don't have to pay out of pocket. Feel free to reach out if you want to talk through some things, I'm always down to talk REI. Best of luck on your journey!

@Chafic El Amatoury congrats on finding what seems to be 2 great deals! Most people starting off have a hard time just finding one. I have a 113 year old property and there are definitely a lot of hidden costs that you would need to account for. To me it comes down to quality of life, if you can't stand the thought living in a sorority then don't. It also doesn't mean you have to pass up one of the deals, get creative and you may find a way to get your hands on both. Keep us posted, we'd love to hear how you make this work.

Impressive results @Rashad K.! It's great to see you give that property new life. I've been looking into the BRRRR method and stuff like this makes me even more driven to get my systems lined up for a BRRRR.

Hey @Adam Weisenburger, welcome to the BP community! There is a lot of information out there and its easy to be overwhelmed by it all. It looks like you made the first steps to narrowing down what you want to do, Small Multifamily BRRRR sounds awesome, its actually something I've recently been looking into. If you want more information on BRRRR, BP has podcasts episodes, books, and calculators for BRRRR education and analysis. Good luck with your REI journey, and feel free to reach out if you'd like to chat.

Welcome Brian! In addition to our names being the same, I to attended the U of M. BP is a great place to connect and ask questions. In fact, through the connections I've made I was able to get my first property in December. Feel free to reach out if you have any questions.

@Account Closed

Thanks for continuing to add your input! I'm impressed with the quantity and quality of advice shared, I'm loving BP more the more I use it. 

@Tim Swierczek thanks for the invite to chat about installing laundry, I'll set something up.

@James Hamling I think what allowed for the quick turnaround is that I was forgetting the return on investment which the BP community smartly pointed out. Thanks for the advice on waste and water lines, I'll make sure to consult a professional before getting to ahead of myself. If you have any suggestions on a good Plumber or Electrician I'd love to hear it.

@Alex Olson, @Kurt Kleespies, @Jane Lee, @Account Closed

Thanks everyone for your responses. I like that you all basically came to the same thought that putting in unit laundry would likely be a good RETURN ON INVESTMENT. I was thinking only in terms of costs and not how that in turn would likely increase the rent of the upper unit as well as make all tenants much happier. Thanks to you all I'll be more careful to look at things as a return on investment (in $ and in renter happiness) rather than just a sunk cost.

I already have an idea of where to put the in unit laundry. I have a small hallway sandwiched between the kitchen and bathroom which I should be able to wall off, making the bathroom slightly longer (added perk!). The laundry would then go where the hallway used to be (the now extended part of the bathroom) and shares a wall with the kitchen sink (water access). 

I have an up-down duplex (2bed/1bath per unit) that I'm currently house hacking in NE Minneapolis, MN. The laundry is in the basement, however, the only way the upper unit can get to the basement is either through the bottom unit or an exterior door. This property was converted some years back from a single family to duplex, hence the strange basement access. I'm living in the upper unit as it is the smaller unit and would command less in rent and currently finishing up some renovations on the bottom unit, but will soon be looking to get tenants in the bottom unit. Once the bottom unit is occupied I'm fine taking the exterior route to the basement, however, if I move out one day and try to rent the upper unit I doubt renters would appreciate the exterior route in the cold/snowy Minnesota winter. I really only see 3 options: 1. have the upper unit take the exterior route, 2. install stacked laundry in the upper unit, or 3. work something out with the bottom unit to allow occasional access for the upper tenants to get to the basement for laundry. I think option 3 would be optimal (no extra install costs and no need to walk outside to do laundry), but not sure how I would go about implementing that. Hopefully, I can start a dialog on what has worked for others.