All Forum Posts by: Chris Allen

Quote from @Levi Koskan:

Howdy BP community, thank you in advance.

In addition to doing my own research, I'm also looking for STR Property Manager recommendations from this community. BP has provided so much value to me and my RE endeavors that a recommendation would go a long way in helping me find the right partner.

Why now?
I've been a house hacker the last 7 years. Started with LTR tenants, then bought my second house and I converted an ADU to an STR while I still lived there. Due to a growing family I've had to move into my LTR home recently. I've been managing the STR myself and I'm comfortable managing it myself but due to some of the unique aspects of the property, I feel that having a professional STR PM involved might lead to one of those situations where by me doing less I'll actually get more out of the property.

If anyone has experience with a well established STR PM that has the below assets, I'd love to hear about it!

The right kind of PM for me:
- Is established in the STR space and has a sizable team, including a handyman on staff.
- Can perform an audit of my property, it's unique attributes, and make data driven recommendations on optimal strategies to increase performance.
- With their portfolio, they have access to a property management software that will allow syndication to more channels then I can manage myself. Outside of Airbnb, VRBO and Booking.com, I'd like to be listed on TripAdvisor, on Google's Vacation Rental Search results (only available to approved PMs, not individuals like myself, and potentially flipkey, fullyfurnished, and craigslist.
- I'd prefer they be local to ATX but I don't see that as a hard requirement if they are highly reputable and have access to locals.

I'm a willing partner, I can commit to:
- Super clear and reasonable on expectations 
- Being super responsive to requests. Be it unique guest requests or repair requests. 
- Open to suggestions on property amenity improvements and listing management
- Available to review reports and communicate openly.

If anyone in this community has first hand experience with a PM that you think I should meet with, I'd REALLY appreciate the recommendation.

Again, thank you for the attention and help!

@Levi Koskan I sent you a request. I live in Temple just north of Austin and di STR in the area. I know a guy in New Braunfels that owns and manages several STR's between Austin, Fredericksburg, NB, Texas Coast and TN. Would love to connect yall.

Quote from @Chris Seveney:

@Chris Allen

Check out

Luxe locker

I think I heard someone doing something similar to this on a podcast. He was doing it in Nebraska with I think 500sqft and 1000sqft storage lockers that ended up being used mostly as garages for small business owners and contractors. 

Not what I was thinking about but definitely interested. 

Does anyone else get random business ideas or unique real estate strategies from time to time? I would love to hear different random business ideas and unique real estate strategies! 

Here are a few of my Random Ideas!

- RV/Camper/Boat storage where owners can store their "toys" for "free" by allowing us to operate them as rentals while also giving them options to use their toys anytime!

- Building out a trailer as a refrigerated beer tap/coffee bar/event trailer. Would rent out just the trailer for events where they could provide their own Kegs to tap in our trailer and it is refrigerated for storage of event food/flowers. Basically an event trailer for rent. 

I had a random thought a few weeks ago for a potential business (far off from something I would actually be willing to try right now) and I wanted to see if anyone has heard of something like this or if this could even be a decent business. 

So I noticed a lot of Boat and RV storage facilities where these "toys" are just sitting in a spot and wasting away money and space until the owner wants to pull them out for use. My thought was what if; you offered an RV and/or Boat storage facility where you could potentially make the owners money, or at least free storage??

Basically my thought for the RV/camper storage would be to build out an RV park with covered spaces for the RV's. Instead of marketing it strictly as an RV park, you could market it as "free" RV storage where the owners of said RV's are able to park their campers in a covered facility, but they agree to partner with us by allowing us to rent out these campers/RV's as STR's. The campers would not be taken by guest, but rather just act as hotel rooms at an RV resort.

I have not given it enough thought to work out all the details, but was thinking owners could pull their campers out for use with prior notice, and then the spot would convert from "free" storage, to paid storage if they desire to bring the camper back since we would no longer be earning income from that unit. The campers would be professionally cleaned and maintained, and treated as an AirBNB. I figured this could also work for Boats as well to an extent?

Any thoughts on this? Or anyone care to share their day dreaming business ideas?

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment in Sevierville.

Purchase price: $573,000
Cash invested: $65,000
Sale price: $735,000

Purchased a 2:2 with a loft cabin in the Smoky Mountain market in 2021. Rented for two years and sold for a profit of $176k.

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

After listening to Avery Carl's first episode about the Smoky Mountain market and talking to other investors in that area, I decided to pull the trigger and purchase.

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

Found on the MLS via my realtor with the Short Term Shop. We saw that the property came back on the market after falling out of contract d/t the inspection report. We offered $1k over asking with no inspection (used the previous report) and beat out another offer. Appraisal came back low and we were able to negotiate the PP to be the appraised value.

How did you finance this deal?

10% down conventional financing.

How did you add value to the deal?

We added a little better decor, TV's and took some better pictures. There a few minor maintenance things that we repair over the 2 years, but no major value add repairs. The housing market did the rest.

What was the outcome?

1 year of GREAT cash flow, 1 year of break even cash flow, and a sale where we walked away with $176k.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

1) Even early 2000's build properties begin to have some pretty major capital expenditures
2) Having a property with very little maintenance issues is critical to a very successful AirBNB business.
3) STR's are not all sunshine and rainbows. They do take work and consistency. We continue to operate STR's but now will be more selective with the condition of those properties.

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

The Short Term Shop.

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment in Sevierville.

Purchase price: $573,000
Cash invested: $65,000
Sale price: $735,000

Purchased a 2:2 with a loft cabin in Sevierville,TN. Purchased with a 10% down loan and rented out as an STR. 2021 Gross income was $97k where I was able to Net about $35k from March 2021- December 2021. 2022 did not go as well with overall market was down, as well as my cabin had a few events that led me to re-funding large bookings (snow storms causing power outage and guest unable to access cabin, wild fire evacuations, and an issue with Bat's...). We decided to sell our cabin in 2023 to take advantage of the equity to put into other projects as well as have our personal finances a little more secure. The cabin had some big ticket items that needed to be taken care of, so after giving the buyers some credit at closing, we walked away with about $176k from closing.

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

After listening to Avery Carl's first episode about the Smoky Mountain market and talking to other investors in that area, I decided to pull the trigger and purchase.

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

Found on the MLS via my realtor with the Short Term Shop. We saw that the property came back on the market after falling out of contract d/t the inspection report. We offered $1k over asking with no inspection (used the previous report) and beat out another offer. Appraisal came back low and we were able to negotiate the PP to be the appraised value.

How did you finance this deal?

10% down conventional financing.

How did you add value to the deal?

We added a little better decor, TV's and took some better pictures. There a few minor maintenance things that we repair over the 2 years, but no major value add repairs. The housing market did the rest.

What was the outcome?

1 year of GREAT cash flow, 1 year of break even cash flow, and a sale where we walked away with $176k.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

1) Even early 2000's build properties begin to have some pretty major capital expenditures
2) Having a property with very little maintenance issues is critical to a very successful AirBNB business.
3) STR's are not all sunshine and rainbows. They do take work and consistency. We continue to operate STR's but now will be more selective with the condition of those properties.

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

The Short Term Shop.

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment in Sevierville.

Purchase price: $573,000
Cash invested: $65,000
Sale price: $735,000

Purchased a 2:2 with a loft cabin in Sevierville,TN. Purchased with a 10% down loan and rented out as an STR. 2021 Gross income was $97k where I was able to Net about $35k from March 2021- December 2021. 2022 did not go as well with overall market was down, as well as my cabin had a few events that led me to re-funding large bookings (snow storms causing power outage and guest unable to access cabin, wild fire evacuations, and an issue with Bat's...). We decided to sell our cabin in 2023 to take advantage of the equity to put into other projects as well as have our personal finances a little more secure. The cabin had some big ticket items that needed to be taken care of, so after giving the buyers some credit at closing, we walked away with about $176k from closing.

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

After listening to Avery Carl's first episode about the Smoky Mountain market and talking to other investors in that area, I decided to pull the trigger and purchase.

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

Found on the MLS via my realtor with the Short Term Shop. We saw that the property came back on the market after falling out of contract d/t the inspection report. We offered $1k over asking with no inspection (used the previous report) and beat out another offer. Appraisal came back low and we were able to negotiate the PP to be the appraised value.

How did you finance this deal?

10% down conventional financing.

How did you add value to the deal?

We added a little better decor, TV's and took some better pictures. There a few minor maintenance things that we repair over the 2 years, but no major value add repairs. The housing market did the rest.

What was the outcome?

1 year of GREAT cash flow, 1 year of break even cash flow, and a sale where we walked away with $176k.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

1) Even early 2000's build properties begin to have some pretty major capital expenditures
2) Having a property with very little maintenance issues is critical to a very successful AirBNB business.
3) STR's are not all sunshine and rainbows. They do take work and consistency. We continue to operate STR's but now will be more selective with the condition of those properties.

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

The Short Term Shop.

Quote from @Michele Granata:

Hey to everyone in the community!

I'm an ICU Nurse of 8 years who has gone part time and is very motivated to begin my journey with REI. I've spent the last two months reading books, listening to podcasts, and doing lunches with agents I know to get insight from their end.

I don't want to get too comfortable in the learning stage. I want to get out there. Similar to nursing, no matter how much schooling you do, you really learn everything with your first job/first patients. That's how I feel it will be with investing. Take the plunge.

I know how much I'm comfortable investing financially. I know the niche I'm looking to pursue. I know I want a partnership for my first deal so that we can both bring strengths to the table. I'm currently in the step of learning to analyze.

But after this, what's my next real step?

It seems everyone's first partnerships were with family or close friends. I'm not sure I have any obvious partners in my life.

 Hey there, I am a fellow ICU nurse as well. I actually have a buddy that is about to move up to NJ for CRNA school at Rutgers College. If you are really wanting to find someone to partner on a house hack together, you could maybe target other nurses or students heading up for graduate school. I could always as him if that would be something that might interest him and his wife, but that could be a great situation for someone in CRNA school who is already paying a few hundred thousand on school and not able to really work. 

Depending on how much capital you are ready to invest, I would suggest 1) either look into other less expensive markets to invest in, or 2) find a local investor that you could be a capital partner with and learn from them at the same time.  

Quote from @Paul Armstrong:

My name is Paul Armstrong I am a Traveling ICU nurse and have a strong drive and interest to move into the real estate investing world. I currently have a large DTI ratio and want to start applying this to long term wealth after paying all of my school debt down instead of sitting in a bank or the stock market. My next assignment will be located in San Antonio, and I will be there for 3 months plus. I have done a solid amount of research and it seems like a solid foundation market to potentially purchase a first property (Please correct me if I am wrong). I am willing to put in the extra time and hours it takes to succeed and open for partnerships or even just information or tips that any of you established investors may be able to send my way. I look forward to hearing from any of you and appreciate your time in advance. Thank you sincerely Paul Armstrong

 Hey there Paul, I am a Travel ICU nurse as well! I live a few hours north up I-35 in Temple, but I know several investors in San Antonio, as well as a RN who lives and invest there. Would love to connect you all. Where are you currently located?

As a travel nurse myself, I usually check out AirBNB first (easier for me instead of having to go through the whole lease signing, background check, etc..). I would also recommend FB groups as well. Furnished Finder FB group is a good one.