All Forum Posts by: Chanté Owens

@Michaela G. I totally agree! While I am in no position to purchase anything soon, I do agree that the new apartment complexes have a lot of the "Hollywood" glimmer to them, intially, but that soon fades after a time, and you see that you could rent a nice, decent place, and pay a few hundred less a month. Suddenly that fancy mini movie theater on site and 10 pools, etc, doesn't look that inviting.

I can speak from experience, because when I lived in AZ, I had one apartment, that, while I loved it (initially), the prices continued to go up, up and up to where I was paying $900+ per month for a one bed/one bath. Guess what, I moved (closer to my job!) and paid $650 a month. Was it an older property? Yep. Did it have an onsite theater room? Nope, but I never used that .... ever. In respect to the pools, I rarely went to them either (my friends have pools at their houses), so I saved a significant amount of money, and never missed a beat. I lost about 50 sq ft of space, but I couldn't tell. Also, the older place came with a fireplace, which I liked. Also, the area at $650 was still in a beautiful, safe area, and did I mention...5 min from my job!

The B (or C+ buildings) in nice, safe areas are definitely more pocket friendly to the general masses. At that time I was doing very well (financially) but I still didn't want to unnecessarily throw money away. I like a nice clean place with no bugs and my own parking spot/garage.

@David Beard Thanks for the great information. It's stuff I need to keep in mind for myself. I'm not in any position now to purchase anything, but your information was succinctly put, that I had to make a comment.

@Will Barnard That's how all my male friends go to Vegas too! =)

I have a friend in Los Angeles, who began purchasing properties pretty soon after we graduated from college and she owns four or five multi-family properties, and a townhome. When one of her tenants completely trashed a unit in her tri-plex (really disgusting things). She was beside herself because she'd gotten bids for 15-20k to remove offensive items; repair and replace other items to get it back to rental readiness.

After the third contractor came, he saw how distraught she was and ended up doing all of the work for around 6-7k...and yes, it turned out later that he was interested in my friend. However, she is extremely diplomatic and turned it into a win-win situation in that she has him do all of the repairs on her properties...but she made it clear it was a business situation only, and he's respected that now for well over 5 years.

@Rusty Pollard Thanks for the welcome, and yes, Seattle is definitely NOT inexpensive. Good luck to you too, and your move, and hopefully we will meet at an REI meetup!

@Jon Klaus Absolutely! I like Dawn's because they are "reasonable" and more attainable for the initial investor. Will's deals are something you aspire too, and yes, there is a huge chasm in between. That's the great thing about real estate, it's like Baskin & Robbins, there is something for everyone!

@Dawn Anastasi your posts and @Will Barnard post are part of the reason I decided to join the community, so I could give you both huge thumbs up!

I like your posts and purchases, because they are fantastic, and you are crushing it! And I like Will's posts, because you can tell he's extremely knowledgeable, and his deals are ridiculous!

Keep up the great work!

@Zach Schwarzmiller Hello! It's funny that you posted so quickly, because I did bookmark one of your posts to reach out to you when I get there; especially given that you are in that commercial space I'm looking to be involved.

I look forward to moving there in Spring/Summer of next year, and I'll definitely be at some REI meetings! It's going to be hard for me up there at first, since I'm a USC Trojan, and it seems the Washington State schools are trying to regain some foothold in the Pac-12 Football!

Can't wait to meet and connect!

Thanks for the warm welcome @Ned Carey (don't know if I got the @ right).

I am familiar with the Baltimore area, as I used to live in White Marsh, Maryland, and worked in Towson =) GREAT food in Maryland....mmmm, Crab Cakes. Ok, back on topic.

No, I promise I won't wait 5-6 months to post. I just want to ensure I have something worthwhile to say, so as not to waste peoples time. I appreciate all the insight I've received so far, and I agree, a multi-family is definitely going to be the best way for me to go.

Hello BP community! I'll try not to shave too many years off your lives with my introduction, but it's going to be a long one, so I can cover the bases!

I'm not currently an investor...yet, but I had a "serious discussion" month with myself in June, where I decided to evaluate EVERYTHING I was doing at this time, and figure out everything : Current state? Short term goals? Long term goals, and then figure out realistically how I would achieve those goals, and everything came around to ----- Real Estate.

I've been reading BP for over five or six months now, and while I have two very close friends in real estate (one in AZ, one in Cali), I do not pretend to know anything about it, nor do I plan to be as aggressive as a lot of people here with flipping and such; however, I do understand that if leveraged effectively, it can help me reach my ultimate goals, while also doing some wealth building as a nice bonus.

I left the insurance industry about five years ago to pursue some other endeavors, such as starting my own travel agency; doing freelance writing around food and travel, and launching a website all about women in the culinary industry. I'm glad I did, because the work I've done, and continue to do really helped me realize what I am passionate about - helping small business owners realize their dream of business ownership; specifically around the hospitality industry, ie, restaurants, bars, taverns and B&B's and boutique hotels, and business owners who lease space in commercial strip mall developments.

So...with that in mind, and my soul searching in the month of June; I decided to jump back into insurance, but work in the area I liked the most, which was assisting my policyholders. I recently obtained my P&C (property & casualty) Insurance Producers license, and will forge ahead with writing insurance policies for commercial business owners. I have a vast knowledge within the insurance industry, as I was in claims for many years; worked in regulatory compliance, and even managed in collections of premium audits in a Finance division, so I pretty much have a 360 degree viewpoint of the insurance industry. Also, I am an Independent Arbitrator for FINRA, so that also keeps me abreast of regulatory issues, while continually honing my negotiation skills.

What I want to do is continue to learn from BP, and eventually (in two years or less) purchase an owner-occupied multi-family unit (duplex or triplex) and live there, and then eventually purchase a commercial property to house my insurance business, and rent space to other businesses who can assist small business owners, like attorney's, cpa's and the like. Ultimately, I want to use these investments as collateral to open my own wine bar(s) and a boutique hotel of my own. I know I have a lot of work ahead of me, but I'm invested in this and doing everything humanly possible to achieve this goal.

I look forward to answering any questions that anyone may have in respect to insurance. Even if I don't know the answer, I have a lot of colleagues and friends still in various aspects of the insurance industry, and they are highly knowledgeable. I am willing to help anyone, because I know insurance can leave a bad taste in your mouth, but as me and my colleagues used to say, "Insurance is what you wished you had, when you failed to have it." Having the wrong or inadequate insurance policy is almost worse than not having insurance at all.

I currently live in the Denver area, but will be relocating to the Pacific Northwest region (likely to Seattle/surrounding area, since I won't be able to afford to live in Seattle when I first move there). I look forward to working with commercial realtors, as I will be building other components of my business in order to assist small business owners to locate and obtain financing for the lease or purchase of their business property.I'm excited, because I just ran across a great article about the SBA 504 loan program, and I'll be reading even more, so I can add value to those business owners that I work with.

I have this great community to thank for helping me realize that while I have some lofty goals, and a LOT of work ahead of me, anything is not impossible. I feel like I know some of you already, because I've read your words so frequently! I'm thankful for Paula Pant, who is a blogger here on BP, as well as one of her sites, Afford Anything. It is was through Paula's writings (and love for travel, like me) that I found my way to this wonderful and giving community. I'll jump in when I can, and I promise to (attempt) to ask intelligent questions. I look forward to when I post to the "Real Estate Success Stories" section!

Cheers from the Mile High State!