All Forum Posts by: Danny Grey

Not necessarily. The reason Los Angeles originally became the hub of the TV and film industry in the first place is because of the natural lighting (sunshine most of the year) which was a necessity at the time and because of the nearby environments which allowed all kinds of scenery to be filmed within a few hours of the city.

need a beach scene? Drive an hour to Malibu.

need a snow scene? Drive two hours to Big Bear.

a desert scene? out to the Sonora you go!

etc.

However, cameras, lighting rigs and editing have evolved so that the California sunshine isn't nearly as needed as it used to be, and as you well know, tax credits in other cities can make it much more lucrative to film elsewhere. 

As local and state costs and taxes continue to rise in LA (which they will) larger and larger segments of the industry will continue to leave LA. That doesn't mean they'll all head to Texas, but this is big country and a bigger world and California is not nearly as important to many of its most prominent industries as Californians seem to think. 

I went to UCLA and loved it and lived in La Jolla for years afterwards, so I get the appeal. But California is simply no longer the Golden State, and a lot of folks are gonna be in for a rude awakening as companies decide to set up shop elsewhere.

Just food for thought. Cheers

1. Austin is not a place to look for multifamily that cash flows from day 1. If you want to end up with a multifamily property in Austin that does cash flow, you'll need to find ways to increase rents.

2. All of the perma-bears who bet against rising prices in Austin have have spent the last 10+ years hanging their heads in shame as those who bought at any point since the last recession have enjoyed their investments becoming more valuable. With that in mind, negative cash flow of -$600-1,000/month to start out may not be bad if you have the financial backing to afford it and you believe values will continue to rise, especially in the context of you paying down a mortgage rather rent.

You're not going to see a dime of it either way.

The time to look for cash flow in Austin was 10 years ago.

As others have said, the problem in this case isn't covid; it's Nashville. Not only is it on lockdown (so less visitors), but because of budget shortfalls they just approved a property tax hike of 34%. 

https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2020/06/17/nashville-approves-new-budget-34-percent-tax-hike-increase-funds-police-schools/3200993001/

As others have said, a lot of areas are doing great for STRs right now, particularly places that are away from the masses. Packed cities? Not doing as well.

The time to look for cash flow in Austin was 10 years ago.

Austin now is all about developing property and/or sitting on property for the appreciation.

Yup. Kyle, TX (25 minutes south of Austin on the way to San Antonio) is one of the fastest growing cities in Texas and property is getting snapped up rapidly now. New Braunfels and San Marcos (on the same route but closer to SA) are growing fast too. 

Eventually, the entire area between Austin and San Antonio is going to be developed. A lot of smart money getting in there now. 

Berkshire Hathaway also recently posted a $50 Billion quarterly net loss. The Oracle of Omaha is nearly 90 years old and many of his top execs have left in the last few years. He simply may not have the answers this time around. 

Then again BH is still sitting on more than $100 billion in cash, so they could just be waiting for prices to start diving again. Who knows? Interesting times we live in.

Respectfully, I've heard this nonsense my whole life, and it's NEVER been useful. All it's ever done is to demoralize and demean us by allowing us to shift blame for our failures to others. 

Please show me "plenty of data and evidence" that our collective issues are caused by "the consequences of slavery, racism and injustice". Those are pretty buzzwords, but considering members of many races have been enslaved en masse since the dawn of time yet many are doing better than us, that theory seems flimsy at best. 

An example:  North Africans spent hundreds of years raiding villages in the Mediterranean, capturing and enslaving southern Europeans.  There were more of those Europeans taken as slaves by North Africans than African slaves taken to America. Plus, they were still capturing and enslaving those Europeans for decades after America freed their slaves. Yet many of the descendants of those European slaves (the ones who weren't castrated) are doing extraordinarily well today. Which begs the question: why aren't more of us?

From what I've seen since I was a young man, the simple truth is that we hold ourselves down as a people more than anyone else ever could. When I look at crime stats, it shows that the vast majority of us who are violently victimized are victimized by each other. When I see 73%+ of us born out of wedlock with no focus on family or properly caring for the future generation, that's on us too. When I see my brothers and sisters come upon some money, I rarely see them invest or build businesses, however I often see them mismanage it. 

I would ask you: Why is it anyone else's responsibility to help us rise? We must rise on our own. And we can.

I stand by my opinion that this entire thread is gross and demeaning, and it reflects poorly on Bigger Pockets and the serious investors here. It has done one thing though: it's revealed the soft bigotry of many members here who think we need their help because our race makes us less capable.

I'm thankful to those here that I've interacted with on the forum and in person who treated me the same way they treat any other real estate investor and enthusiast. As for the white saviors in this thread and society in general, we really have no use for your condescension or pity, and the sooner you realize it actually hurts us in the long run the better off we'll all be.

The best buying opportunity might not necessarily be college towns , but rather areas where you have student rentals that you could rent out to non-students if the college(s) imploded and student demand waned.

Example: I know an investor who owns several apartment complexes in the El Cerrito area of San Diego, near San Diego State University. He rents to students, but if that market dried up for any reason, he's still within a few miles of downtown San Diego, near 2 major freeways, and is just a few miles from the coast, so his rentals would still be attractive to enough people to keep them rented.

Just food for thought. The world is moving so fast that I think we all need to be ready to pivot strategies quickly if needed.