All Forum Posts by: Chester Davis

I’m on the board of a small camp in Crofton, NE (near Yankton SD) (~120 beds, 80k budget) and we have had insurance policy adjustments in policy and costs for last 4-5 yrs. Currently, the change is up $3500/yr and laying a 10k deductible on each building. Outrageous considering we can re-roof and reside cabins by contractor without hitting a 10k deductible. We currently are paying out 1k+/month for insurance. 

Two basic questions 

First,
I have been told by director that we have 3-4 insurance companies that will write a policy. I am thinking that perhaps we could insure building and operations separately and that might open some options in insurance providers. Any thoughts on this and suggestions on who to talk with?

Second, 
Maybe drop insurance from cabins and only insure the high value buildings and have an umbrella policy or something to cover general liabilities etc. 

I would really appreciate some input on creative ways to trim budget on insurance.

Hello Friends, 

for about $400k if a person acted fast, for off market sale, could have 90,000 sf commercial building in fort Dodge ia. 

This building is an older federal building with a main floor of about 30,000 sf with about 18 ft ceiling.  It has some pretty cool features such as court room, prison rooms, and radiation/bomb shelter.  I’d really love to pick it up and make some useful community growing business. Even though the city is very willing to not be an obstacle in building the community is outside my abilities right now. 

For fun I’d love to know what you would do with full basement and 3 additional floors of about 22k sf each. Total is 90k sf not including basement. 

If you are a serious interested investor I’m glad to put you in touch with the seller. (I do not have any interest in the building but am friends with the owner)

Thank you 

I agree that risk is distributed to the invested parties and using banks as a way to leverage investments is much faster. Here is my thoughts and check me if I’m off:

I think the real heart concern for my bride is the risk of over leverage and having some unexpected costs take us out financially. This is because we have spent a lot of years slogging through nothing and several major value add live and flips and a fix and flip during GFC to get to place where we own the house and have a bit of IRA and enough to start building an empire (evil laugh).
Because of those concerns I think that a modified Brrr makes sense so that acquisition and rehab is covered in cash and ending with a low debt to income ratio. This providing an exit path if things go particularly bad. Anyhow this way we do not risk anything we would hate to lose. 
Yes it will take longer but my wife would be on board and if your wife is happy…..   

Hello colleagues, 

The question: 

Does anyone have a resource, chart or best an excel spreadsheet function which explores the relationships of future cash flow goals, time horizon and DTI, perhaps oriented toward someone looking to the small but mighty perspective?

The reason: 

The biggest elements of getting my wife’s enthusiastic mutual agreement is:

A. Having a clear plan showing a variety of “if bad things happen” scenarios plotted out (economic woes, bad tenants, unexpected expenses) 

B. Keeping a low level of risk; low DTI, diversified risk, etc but I think primarily it is solving the question "if something bad happens can we carry the property and for how long?".

to further these objectives I am planning to start the acquisition process as "cash only" plus some forced appreciation, put into LTR or managed MTR, establish records and build a very healthy reserve account attached to the property, refinance with low DTI to pull some equity for next acquisition.
i started building a spreadsheet but thought “I know I am not the only one, why reinvent the wheel without reason?”, I’m sure that someone already has done it and might be willing to share.

Thank you all. 

Chet Davis

Projects4Missions.com