All Forum Posts by: Darson Grantham

Hey Zach, I work with a lot of investors that live outside of Iowa but love the investing market in Des Moines.

Cash flow is kind of a loaded question, depedning on how you are calculating.  With a conversion multifamily I've seen a few that are selling around 230-250 that have total rents of around 2400-2500.  THey are in C neighborhoods and C properties.

If you are looking for A or B properties, there is little cashflow but super stable.  The Des Moines median sale prices have gone up 5-9% YOY depending on the neighborhood.

Currently the state of Iowa does not allow a city to forbid STR or MTR. BUT if the property is part of an association, it is possible that they will forbid STRs. That is part of DD we'd do on the front end looking for property for you. WE also own and manage a STR company that helps owners maximize their profits and make it to the top of the top list in Des Moines STR.

Selfishly, I'd argue I work with dozens of investors every year and just last year in 2024 I helped 20 bigger pocket members buy or sell properties in Des Moines!

I also run the local investor facebook group for investors, and host real estate investor meetups weekly and monthly if you ever come back and want to network with local investors!

I have pre-vetted Bankers, handyman, and property managers to share also!

Good luck on your search!

@Kenneth Taylor yes your contractor background can be an amazing link to optimizing real estate investing as you likely already know! 

I appreciate the tag Ryan! We hold a monthly meetup and also a weekly meetup locally here in Des Moines.

2nd Tuesday is the monthly event at a local restaurant.

Weekly on Friday mornings is the other at a local coffee shop.

Both are great events that if you pour in, you'll be poured into!

 Love this... "Ohio or Iowa is enough". Well if you need Iowa let me know! 62% of my units sold in 2023 were investor deals (and I had 50+ transactions). I don't agree with the sentiment that Iowa is boring, but it sure is stable. 

Unfortunately I don't know anyone personally down there, but send me a message and I'll reach out to two of my clients that I know have properties down in Chariton to see if maybe they know someone. 

From my experience that small-town investing is very localized.  I've owned 8 units (two buildings) in SE Iowa and there was no good option for management and I had to develop my Rolodex of venders and people to help me with the properties.  I set up systems so that it was mostly operational virtually, but did have the occasional vendor job that needed hired out. 

The tenants didn't mind because I was a better landlord virtually than most landlords that were in town (small towns have many landlords with bad reps and bad properties).

Good luck, sorry I couldn't be more help!

Hi Lucas,

I hate doing this but when you say rural Des Moines area, what do you mean, specifically how far away from downtown Des Moines and if out of the city, what direction?

Congrats on posting here to gather advice from all walks of life! Its how I started in 2018 and starting convos with other investors be it in person or online is KEY to learning IMO.  Below I'll answer your qestiosn, the best I can!  If you want to know the lay of the land in the Des Moines area let me know!  I help a lot of folks from BP get started in the Des Moines Metro.

First - Does anyone have experience in these locations, or have other suggestions for us to consider?  - Yes I have experience in Des Moines, both as an investor and an investor-friendly agent.  (I host multiple meetups for investors throughout the city)

Second - Should we begin with single family homes, or try multi-family to start? How much should we invest in the first property or, alternatively, how much should we keep in reserves for purchasing other properties? if you are set on MTR, I'd say evaluate both types an learn the returns and pros and cons of each.  MTR rents will be different at a SFH vs Duplex vs 10 plex.   You have the funds it sounds like to do any of them here in Des Moines, so then it just comes down to which attributes to you prefer about each type of property. 

Third - if y'all are, or know of any investor-friendly agents in these locations that are open to talking with us, we'd love to get a conversation going. - As i said above, happy to talk! 

There are a handful that you can find online but most of them are word of mouth only, which is super funny to me as a guy who LOVES marketing in all kinds of ways.

But to answer your question, Top Shelf (Mike Subman) would be a top recommendation, along with PMI (Chris Fisher). Both have solid businesses, not too big that they forget who they work for, but not onesy twosy managment that is barely a business and needs to nickle and dime to stay afloat.

@Nathan Faselt, not typically if you are going to occupy the property.  Commercial lender wont have a few terms as good as owner occupied (2-4 unit) properties.  

Reach out to Tyler Osby’s team. (Just google them) Tyler and is team are very familiar with house hacking. 

ah, thanks for explaining, I can attest, definitely not legal here in Iowa.  That has to be negotiated with the listing agent. Same result, but a different process.  Although, in my experience agents who discount commissions their own OR the other agent's commission are typically not at the same level of providing service and advice.  I might get some hate, but after a couple of hundred transactions in my short agent career, is VERY transparent, you get what you pay for. 

Now being from iowa I’m curious what is a buyer rebate?