All Forum Posts by: Carlos Quiros

Oh yes appreciation will come. 10 mile is a little far tho. That job site is unlike anything I've seen. Goes further than the eye can see.

Here's some info but some of the Indy locals could offer more insight or have updated investor maps.

@Jaron Walling knows Indy well 

I favor the East Side (Christian Park, Grace Tuxedo Park, Brookside Park, Bosart Brown) and was told to avoid 38th and Post Road. The SFH I bought in March 2023 is in Christian Park. A lot of it is street by street and it's difficult to go just by zip codes. I don't know a lot about the West side but a couple of investors recommended avoiding Martindale-Brightwood. I also stay away from railroad tracks. Other options are if your property is close to hospitals and downtown you could do mid-term rentals to travel nurses

https://learn.roofstock.com/blog/indianapolis-housing-market

There are several videos on Indy on this channel:

https://www.youtube.com/@IndyInvestor

Here's another site.

https://lifeinindy.com/neighborhoods/

This video is 2 years old so some of the areas have shown a lot of development but still has good information: 

Hey Carlos,

I'm a bit north of you in the Central Coast and I invest heavily in Detroit.

In most markets it's difficult to find cash flow today if you're just plucking stuff from the MLS.

But in terms of your line items here is what I do...

Insurance I ballpark at $75/mo for a single-family house and $120/mo for a duplex. These numbers correlate well to my own portfolio as well as what I see other investors getting for theirs.

I glob maintenance/capex/vacancy into one line item and I assign 20% of gross rents. This is pretty conservative, especially considering most of our stuff we do off-market and then do an immediate cosmetic update. We update plumbing and electrical at this point if needed too. 

So I'm likely overestimating that line item but that's how I prefer to do it.

Management fee is generally 10% gross rents in my market.

Again, in Detroit all utilities are generally on the tenant. The outlier here is on multi-family stuff where there's usually just one water meter. So landlords generally cover that to keep things easy. That said, you can write something into the lease where you pay water up to a certain amount/month.

Happy to help more if I can. I know it can be super overwhelming!

Carlos, I am not familiar with those markets but some basic things apply to any market.  Given the economic situation now, higher prices for property, and higher interest rates, be very careful overextending in the "hope" that you will overcome at least one shortcoming.

I do not believe that we are going to see appreciation shortly, the market is currently in a period of adjustment with prices likely to drop rather than increase.  A few years ago you could invest based on appreciation, that's not the case in much of the country now.  

You should have at least six months of free cash to make up for any losses that were incidental and not planned.  I recommend to my clients that they should wait a while for the market to stabilize, there will be many foreclosures, particularly with short-term rental owners.  There will be a good time to snap up those distressed properties fully furnished.  

Remember cash is king.  Hold on to as much as you can now and be very careful about taking on debt.  I sincerely believe that now is always a good time to buy but you need to buy right.