All Forum Posts by: Chris Blackburn

We just started! (OK, started over a year ago and have been working on entitlements, clean up, demo, engineering, plans, financing, syndication and 20 other things. However, we have yellow iron on the ground. We love the site and really like working with Keizer. (Keizer is adjacent to Salem (Oregon's second largest metro area 500K people). We had plans of going from construction finance, to HUD permanent. We have had some interest in a sale upon stabilization, however, holding long term has typically worked out really well for most. We have several hundred more doors planed over the next 3-4 years and excited that we can still make the numbers pencil! This was our first syndication. Fully funded by qualified friends and family and several of our major contractors. We are hoping to have occupancy in 10 months for the first units. Excited to get our other projects to this point.

Typically these are cadets and pretty common.   They may not be as efficient as a split system or standard gas/electric furnace.

They are terrible if the house is poorly insulated,  cost about $2.50 a day if you run them all the time. 

Trying to find comparative data to understand the dynamics of assisted living.   Most of my work is formula driven, in understanding the costs, income, care level, demographics, employment challenges, location and more, I would love to connect with a group or owner who feels they are able to understand and provide a advantage or model for sucess.  We have 1 project under our belt and several more opportunites to look at.  This is new construction.  60-100 units, potential for memory care or over 55 feeder housing.  Additionally, I think I solve the labor problem.  (Ask me how) It is not cheap and is a long term solution.    Let me know if you can help.  Chris Blackburn Clutch Industries. 

How do you determine major improvements to the new "owner" HOA like fee? It is like you turned into a condo, without the association fee. Which attorney are you using? Rent to own, with small down sounds simple. Devil is in the details. Excited to see how you prepare for the details. Good fences make good neighbors, good contracts and clarity make good deals.

@Mikayla Mitchell We are still building. Rents continue to rise, (at some point unsustainable) My plan is to build the nicest 3-story woody walkups (This is typically a 3 story 8,12,16 plex, all wood construction, hopefully, the same exact design that I built before) This, to my perception, is the lowest risk category of housing. We are going into a 112-unit project next month, we have the loan in place, and most of the funding (first syndication). It looks like lumber prices will be slowing down. We invited our interested larger subs to be part of the investment. We believe they will be very attentive toward the success of the project. The proforma works great. It is a $20M loan to get this built with about $6M for required cash. We get to perform as Developer, GC, and an investor. I think we may even see some slow down in projects that may give us better pricing or at least a stronger build timeline. A short view on the economy, (my opinion) the Feds will do a 100 bips (1%) raise at the next meeting since they skip a month. We are already seeing an impact in upper-end housing, (one of the local builders has 6 spec homes sitting right now) The FEDS want to tame inflation and the only way will be pain (high interest rates). They will play out this narrative for the next year (And the media will LOVE pushing stories to manipulate our fear, worry, and attention) This recession could be the next BIG Concern so our attention is focused on this and not trying to make the world a better place -sorry too deep here:(- In any event, I believe this is the BEST time to be pushing projects if you have the capital to weather a few bit of a slowdown. I expect a return to quantitative easing in 2024 to support whatever political regime (Democrat or Republican) is needing to look good. The low-interest rates will return and allow me to refi at 80LTV with HUD 35-year rates, take some cash, get my investors some or all of their investment, and keep feeding them their percentage of rents. If rates are too high, we just refi the existing loan, and wait for a better rate environment. If you are putting together a project, choose flat land (excavation is a HUGE line item), Build simple, nice apartments, focus on what women want. (nice kitchen, nice bathroom, big closet, good security/lighting) Women have ecliped men in the workforce, they are better educated, better credit, less violent, less likely to commit a crime, typically cleaner, and are more responsible. (Let me know if anyone disagrees but I think most of that data can be proven factually) We would NEVER discriminate, but we can build for a

specific customer.  

Maybe it is time to start a developers coop that shares some of this data.  We need housing, and eventually, I would be giving all sorts of people the roadmap to build a 6 plex, 12 plex, 24 plex 36 plex and all the secrets we currently use.  It is so hard to jump in, most of my success comes from the team my team has surrounded themselves with.   

Would love to see your numbers and unit mix.  It seems most cities love mixed-use.  What type of first floor commercial are you looking at serving?   How many units?  I know a bigger project going up outside Seattle.  Would be interesting to compare.  We are located in Oregon.   I think for units, we end up paying $10,000-$20,000 per door for raw land.  (It used to be $8,000 :(

@Jack Swank   I think it is pretty standard for our area,  Costs are going up 10% a year,   Here are some stats that show the same:  https://www.statista.com/stati...

I almost want to put together all of this for every state.  We are underserved in multifamily and if the worst thing that happened was too many apartments were built, that would be good for the people and truly show how market demand and capitalism really work.    We have some projects from 15 units to 42 units and proformas based on % of costs that have both been built in the last 12 months.   Some of the huge costs we are seeing are SDC costs and site clean-up.   DEQ requirements, soil testing and clean up is really eating into our estimated costs.  Add the fact that most cities are CRUSHING the developer with HUGE timelines and delays in getting any movement in permits.   10 years ago, everything took a year to get going, 5 years ago it was 2 years, now any project seems to take 3 years to just get entitled.   On top of that, the cost of energy efficiency is adding significant costs and new complications to the projects.  All of this cost more money.  Our total all-in cost to build per door comes out at $240K for new construction (3-story woodywalk-up).  All I can say is the barrier for entry is getting larger and larger EVERY DAY.   Less people will even try to break in.  We are super fortunate to have amazing people working for us.   I am deviating from what should be unbridled Stoicism, but sometimes a guy just has to vent.    

I know my banker uses some software to track the banks, loans.  We use the good old fashion google sheets.