All Forum Posts by: Bryan Eltzroth

@Xavier Brinkman I would look into QuicTile by Daltile. It’s a floating tile floor that clicks and locks together like LVP. You do need to use their own grout which is a little different than tile grout but if you’re efficient, you can tile a bathroom floor in a day from start to finish.

It’s a little pricey but has the durability of tile and is much more waterproof than LVP and the speed at which it can be installed definitely helps the value proposition vs traditional tile.

@Stephen Keighery

This is a great point. On BP, there is a lot of poo pooing of wholesalers but at any REIA event I've been too, wholesalers who actually close deals are top commodities.

Even here on BP, how many times have we seen the "There Are No Deals on the MLS!" thread? Direct mail marketing, driving for dollars and Deal Machine and others like it are talked about all the time, but if a wholesaler is the one using those strategies, it's frowned upon.

I think a lot of the bias comes from people’s past dealings with unscrupulous wholesalers, who are certainly out there, but in the end, the onus is on the investor to run their own due diligence and determine if this is a good deal. Even when people mention that wholesalers take advantage of sellers, many times they ignore those same points when they bring in the deal themselves.

I’m certainly not here to put down agents in any way shape or form! A good agent is a critical member of the real estate team and can work miracles at times. I just also feel that good wholesalers serve a purpose in the funnel in that they provide a service just like a realtor.

In the end, real estate isn’t a zero sum game and we can all coexist peacefully.

@Steve Morris

I understand @Thomas Burnett and his attorney may not have been completely aware of brokerage details in OR but there's no need to stomp all over his deal. He hustled and solved a problem for two parties. The seller may not have desired to deal with an agent along with the commissions and contingencies that go into a normal transaction and the investor was looking for a deal. 

Functionally, it's no different from any other investor looking for off-market deals or steals on the MLS. If a BRRRR investor sent out the same letter, talked to the same seller, and closed the deal themselves, would we be ostracizing them for this deal? Unlikely. We would be celebrating the hustle and determination.

Looking outside the legal ramifications, I feel like wholesalers serve a valuable purpose in the industry. They charge a fee for finding deals and there is nothing wrong with that. It's easy to say investors are more than capable of finding their own deals but we all know that's easier said than done. 

@Marc Rice

@Joe Scaparra

@Erickson Sainval

Thanks for the tips gentlemen! I appreciate the advice. I will work with my tenants to help protect them and I think the month to month with a 90 day landlord vacate policy would work well for both of them in this case.

I will certainly circle back once we’re farther along in this process!

Hi everyone! I am currently entertaining the idea of selling my duplex here in Cincinnati but both of the tenants are M2M. They both just converted and needed the flexibility which was no problem for me.

However, I don’t know how to inform them of the situation and I certainly don’t want them to get a 30 day notice from a new owner as they are great long term tenants who I really respect.

Should I sign them to short term leases to protect them or should I just give them as long a runway as possible?

Thanks all!

@Marc Rice thanks! I appreciate it! Gross rents were increased by $1,500 as one unit was vacant and the other was well below market rate. Rents are now just over $2,150/month.

Investment Info:

Small multi-family (2-4 units) buy & hold investment in Cincinnati.

Purchase price: $228,000
Cash invested: $20,000

Duplex in the Norwood neighborhood of Cincinnati purchased as a House Hack back in 2018. I have subsequently moved out and stabilized rents to near market rate along with handling deferred maintenance as well as improvements to the overall value of the property.

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

After discussing Real Estate strategies with my mentor, we decided a House Hack (didn't even know the term back then!) was the right way to deploy capital as the first step in Real Estate Investing.

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

Off market deal my realtor brought to me from one of his other clients. Negotiation was straightforward aside from some small adjustments in price as well as commission structure.

How did you finance this deal?

FHA Loan

How did you add value to the deal?

Property was owner occupied and rents were >50% below market rate. There was also a significant amount of deferred maintenance on the property. New HVAC was needed along with unkempt landscaping and other small issues due to the age of the house.

What was the outcome?

Gross rents have been increased by nearly $1,500/month and the property is now cashflow positive. Norwood is also an appreciating area so the equity in the house has jumped significantly.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

I've made a ton of mistakes and have occasionally felt I bit off more than I could chew but I have learned so much about deal with contractors, getting bids, assembling a team, and managing a property which has made me much more ready to scale my real estate investments.

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

Pete Kopf was an amazing realtor and I would highly recommend him to any investor in the Cincinnati area. He really has his finger on the pulse of the market.

Yes the market has peaked and we are close to a recession but I wouldn't expect prices to fall too much. There isn't as much exposure on the mortgage side as there was in 05-06 so a slowdown won't cause so many people to default on their mortgages.

We will probably just see a flatline in pricing as interest rates go up.

Obviously this is speaking in generalities. Here in Cincinnati we still have a strong market for new builds and single family owner occ properties.