All Forum Posts by: Connor Nellans

@Kaden Olson Just to give some insight into the appraising issues with ADUs, I recently wrapped up an ADU project at my home in San Diego and it increased the value of my property by about double the amount I put into the project. From what I have seen and heard, this is not the norm and typically ADUs have not been forcing the type of appreciation you would hope for. More often than not I have heard that people are not getting the appraised value they were hoping for after they build their ADU. This is very location dependent within the county but as of right now it seems to be an issue of not having enough comps. One thing that helped us is that we kept the garage space and built on top of it. I would not recommend converting garage space into an ADU, garages are valuable and by converting a garage into an ADU you lose that value. Best of luck and let me know if you have any questions with the ADU process!

@Chris Ng it depends on the property as to whether they would sell quickly with tenants in place. The desirability of the unit will affect whether people are willing to purchase the condo with these tenants in place or not. In short, if these are more entry level condos, they will likely sit longer because buyers for those units are typically going to be owner occupied and will need the unit empty. If they are more luxury style condos or in a very desirable location, these buyers could be looking for a second home, investment property, or they may be able to bring more money to the table and do not need the unit empty to satisfy the owner occupied requirement. The time on market for these tenant occupied condos will be very unit and location specific!

@Dennis Nikolaev it would depend on your equity position in your condos as to whether you would have to sell them all at once or not to get into a $2mil deal here in San Diego. You will likely need at least 20% down for an investment property loan. Depending on the values of your condos and how much equity you have in them you may need to only sell one of them or all 6 of them.

This last October, I 1031ed one condo I owned in the Minneapolis area into one large multifamily rental here in SoCal. This condo was one of my very first rental properties and had a good chunk of equity in it so this worked well. I have experience on the investing side as well as realtor side when it comes to 1031 so please let me know if you have any questions! Would be happy to help. 

@Will R. congrats on the great appreciation! You are sitting on a great opportunity to keep building from here! I think the first question is what is your goal with RE investing? Do you want to quit your job ASAP? Do you want to invest full time? Is cash flow or appreciation your goal? Your goal will help determine where and what type of investing you do. I am from San Diego as well with properties here as well as back home in Minnesota with a balanced strategy of appreciation and cashflow. I like connecting with local people in real estate so never hesitate to reach out if you ever have any questions! 

@Jonathan Wu I found myself in your shoes a few years ago fresh out of school, I would say that experience is the best teacher.Try to align yourself with people who understand where you want to go and have been there before. There are going to be lots of ups and downs in the beginning as a RE investor. 

I would suggest trying to start locally in investing. In my experience as both a local and OOS investor, I would suggest investing locally to a beginner. That's not to say OOS investing is not possible as a beginner, but it can add an extra level of stress/challenges.

 I like your idea of a 3/2 value add property while house hacking. I think this is the BEST way to start in investing. Getting that first property, building some equity, and lowering your living expenses sets you up very well for your future as an investor. That is exactly how I got my start and have snowballed it into a decent sized portfolio of 12 doors since. Best of luck and never hesitate to reach out! Always happy to help and connect with locals in RE!

@Franklin P. welcome to BP! I am an investor and agent here in SD, I am always looking to connect with other people in our local RE space. I have executed multiple BRRRRs here in SD and also out of state back home in Minnesota. Let's connect!

@Jack Landry @Rafael Ramon I work as an investor friendly agent here in San Diego and own multiple rentals here as well with a mixture of STR and LTR, if you ever have any questions I would be happy to help! Feel free to shoot me a DM. I work with clients on finding investment properties often.

Hey @Joshua Vallejos! It sounds like you are on the right track. Off market deals, though harder to find, can offer greater returns when it comes to flipping. It will definitely be grind at first with lots of growing pains, but if you can get to the other side it is worth it. One thing that I would mention is that flipping can be a great way to generate capital but buy and hold investing is the best way to set yourself up in the future IMO. The good thing is both those models can complement each other.

It sounds like you have put some thought into the direction you want to go, my suggestion would be to look at your future business in two parts. The cash producing side and the investment side. Use flips as cash to buy investments. It will be slow at the start but maybe you keep every third flip as an investment. Flip two properties, BRRRR the third, and repeat. It sounds like you have some knowledge around sourcing flip deals, that is an advantage that you should utilize. I know too many people who are in the flipping game and make good money but own no rentals so they just continue on that treadmill. Flipping can be good offense, but sound real estate investing is the best defense. Work to have both.

The Inspectors Company is who I use for my investments as well as who I recommend to my clients, they do a great job! I also have some good plumbers who can video scope the lines for you as part of the inspection (definitely a must in San Diego). I sent you a DM with the details!